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1

More Tales from Tolstoi

• <; < ■ • ■■ ■ # -..- ■>>. ■ > . ■ ;"'.. *■ *' '-. "r y ..-■ — **•

:^ Y* ^

More Tales-from Tolstoi

Translated from the Russian with an Enlarged
Biography of the Author, by

R. NISBET BAIN

WITH PHOTOGRAVURE PORTRAIT

BRENTANO'S

UNION SQUARE, NEW YORK

1903

PRESERVATION
COPY ADDED
ORIGINAL TO BE
RETAINED

JAN 27 1994

KE68E

CONTENTS.

Alb ^
MAnN

PAGE

BIOGRAPHY .... 7

I. THE SNOWSTORM ... 47

JI. THE CAPTIVE IN THE CAUCASUS 4 95

III. HATRED IS SWEET, BUT GOD IS STRONG - 1^8

IV. ELIAS - - - - - - I42

V. THE TWO BROTHERS AND THE GOLD - I50

VI. THE CHILDREN WISER THAN THE ELDERS - 154

VII. THE DEATH OF IVAN IL'iCH - - 158

VIII. THE PENITENT SINNER .... 249

IX. THREE DEATHS .... 253

X. THE STORY OF IVAN THE FOOL - - 275

BIOGRAPHY.

Le^ Nikolaivich Tolstoi was born on September
9th, 1828, at his father's estate, Yasnaya Polyana,
in the Government of Tula. His family is said to
have been of German descent, originally bearing the
somewhat plebeian name of Dick,* which they changed
for its Russian equivalent Tolsty, when they migrated
to Muscovy at the beginning of the seventeenth
oentury. The first eminent member of the stock was
Peter Andrievich (1645-1727), one of Peter the
Great's most famous " fledgelings," renowned for his
energy, versatility, and diplomatic finesse, whom his
master richly endowed and raised to countly rank.
Yet Peter himself seems always to have stood on his
guard against him. " Tolstoi," he is reported to have
said, " is an able and intelligent man ; but it is just
as well, when you have anything to do with him, to
have a good big stone handy, that you may be able
to break his teeth in case it should suddenly occur
to him to bite you." It was this sinister sleuth-hound
who hunted down the unfortunate Tsarevich Alexis
in his Neapolitan retreat, and thus drew down upon
himself the well-merited hatred of the Russian people,

* Stout.
7

Biography

who regarded the murdered Prince as a martyr for
orthodoxy. Another ancestor, Peter Aleksandrevich
(1769- 1 844), was a notable warrior, who, after fighting
the Poles and Turks under Suvorov and Napoleon
under Bennigsen, crushed the Polish revolt of 1831,
and quitted the army with the rank of a Field-MarshaL
The Tolstois* though not belonging to the ancient
Muscovite Boyar families themselves, have always
held their heads high fcmomg the modern Russian
aristocracy, and it used to be the boast of the family
that not a single member of it had ever contracted a
misalliance, Tolstoi's own mother was a Princess
Volkhonskaya, his paternal grandmother was a
Princess Gorchakova, his maternal grandmother was a
Princess Trubetskoya, all three of them lineal descen-
dants of Rurik, the antipatriarch of the Muscovite
Tsars. Tolstoi himself had a strong outward
resemblance to his grandfather, Prince Nicholas
Volkhonsky (the prototype of Bolkonsby in "War
and Peace "), though of a somewhat rougher build.
Thus for two centuries the bluest of blood has coursed
through the veins of the Tolstois, and though the
present owner of Yasnaya Polyana has been in the
habit of going about in peasant's garb, the portraits
adorning the walls of the mansion represent, with
scarcely an exception, counts, princes, and privy-
counsellors, all bedizened with stars and ribbons.

Tolstoi's father, Count Nikolai Ilich, was described
by those who knew him as a stately, fascinating
personage. As Lieut-Colonel in the Pavlopadsky
Regiment he had served with distinction throughout
the epoch-making campaign of 18 12-18 13. Nikolai

Biography

Tolstoi inherited from his father an almost bankrupt
estate, and as, after satisfying his father's creditors
to the uttermost farthing, he found it impossible to
subsist on his scanty pay, he resorted to the time-
honoured family practice of marrying a heiress* a
lady of few personal charms but great wealth, con-
siderably older than himself, Maria Ivanovna
Volkhonskaya. Nevertheless this mariage de con-
venance proved an extremely happy though not a very
lasting union, Tolstoi losing his mother when he was
only three years of age (she died in 183 1) and his
father six years later. If, as is commonly supposed,
Tolstoi's mother was the original of the Princess Maria
in " War and Peace," she must, young as he was at
the time of her death, have made a deep impression
upon him. He describes her as of a tender, plaintive,
mystical nature, of such finely woven texture as scarce
to seem to belong to this world, one of those heroines
of self-sacrifice who live not for themselves and " who
do not so much, die as fly to Heaven." One precious
gift she possessed, moreover, which her son certainly
inherited from her, the gift of inventing tales and
stories which held her hearers spellbound. It is
said that when she was in a ballroom she quickly
gathered round her a bevy of curious damsels who
forgot their partners and everything else as they
listened spellbound to the stories of the Princess
Volkhonskaya.

Tolstoi's earliest reminiscences have thus been
recorded by himself in a work published eight years
ago. Perhaps no other great writer's memory has
ever been able to travel so far back.

Biography

hundredth part of what I acquired then? From
a child of five to me, as I am now, is but a step.
From a new-born child to a child of five the distance
is terrific . . .

" The recollections which follow refer only to my
fourth and fifth years, but even of these there are but
few, and not one of them refers to life outside the
walls of the house. Nature till my fifth year did
not exist for me. All that I recollect occurs in my
little bed and in my bedroom. . . People must
have let me play with flowers, with leaves ; they must
needs have shielded me from the sun ; but till my fifth
or sixth year I have not a single recollection of what
we call nature. Possibly one has to get away from
her in order to see her, and I was nature.

•' The next thing after my trough that I recollect
is the recollection of Eremeevna. ' Eremeevna ' was
the word with which they used to frighten us children.
No doubt they frightened us long before this, but my
recollection of it is as follows : I am in my little bed,
and very happy and comfortable, as I always was,
and I should not have remembered anything about it,
if the nurse or someone else who then made part
of my life, had not said something or other in a
voice new to me and went away, and at once a
feeling of terror was added to the feeling of comfort.
And I recollect that I was not alone, but someone
else was there just like me. (This no doubt was my
sister Mashenka, who was a year younger than myself,
for our beds were in the same little room.) And I
recollect there was a little curtain to my bed, and
my sister and I were tremulously delighted at the

12

Biography

extraordinary thing that was befalling us, and I kept
on hiding my head in my pillow and glancing at
the door from which I was expecting something novel
and pleasant to emerge. And we laughed and hid
our faces and waited And behold! someone
appeared in a gown and high cap such as I had
never seen before, yet I recognised it to be the same
person who was always with me (my nurse or my
aunt, which I know not), and this someone spoke in a
gruff voice, which I recognised, something terrible
about naughty children and about Eremeevna. I
trembled with fear and joy, I was terrified and yet
delighted in my terror, and I wanted the someone
who was frightening me not to know that I recognised
her. We were silent, and after that we began to
whisper together — our purpose was to conjure up
Eremeevna again.

"I have another recollection similar to that of
Eremeevna, and possibly later in time, because it
is much clearer, although it has always remained
unintelligible to me. In this recollection the prin-
cipal part is played by a German called Theodor
Ivanovich, our tutor, yet I know for certain that I
was not under his control at the time, so this must
have taken place before my fifth year. And this was
my first impression of Theodor Ivanovich. And it
was of so early occurrence that I still recollected
nobody at that time, neither my brothers, nor my
father. If I have any recollection at all of any par-
ticular person, it is only of my sister, and I only
recollect her because she shared with me my terror
of Eremeevna. Connected with this recollection is

13

Biography

my first consciousness of the fact that our house had
an upper storey. How I got up there, whether I
went there myself, or whether someone carried me, I
don't recollect at all. I only recollect that there were
a good many of us there, and we were all dancing,
holding each other's hands, and there were some
strange women amongst us (I have a dim recollection
that they were washerwomen), and we all began to
leap and caper, and Theodor Ivanovich also leaped,
lifting his feet too high and too noisily and boister-
ously, and the same instant I felt that this was
not right but excessive, and I looked at him, and
meseems I began to cry, and the whole thing came to
an end.

"That is all I can recollect up to my fifth year.
I • remember nothing of my nurse, my aunts, my
brothers, my sisters, my father, my rooms, and my
games. My recollections grow more distinct from
the time when they brought me downstairs to Theodor
Ivanovich and to the older children.

" On being taken downstairs to Theodor Ivanovich
and the children, I experienced for the first time, and
consequently more strongly than at any subsequent
period, the feeling which we call the sense of duty,
the feeling of the cross which everyone is called upon
to bear. It was painful to me to forsake what I had
been accustomed to (accustomed to from eternity,
as it then seemed to me); it was painful, poetically
painful, to part not only from people, from my
sister, my aunt, but also from my little bed with
the curtains, from my little pillow, and frightful
to me was the new life on which I was entering

14

Biography

I tried to find pleasure in the new life which stood
before me; I tried to believe in the endearing
words with which Theodor Ivanovich enticed me
to him ; I tried not to perceive the contempt with
which the other children received me, because I
was smaller than they ; I tried to think that it was a
shame for a big boy to go on living with little girls,
and there was no good at all in the life upstairs with
my nurse ; but at heart I was frightfully miserable,
and I knew that I had lost beyond recall innocence
and happiness, and only the feeling of my own
dignity, the consciousness that I was doing my duty,
sustained me.

" Many times, subsequently, in the course of my life
it has been my lot to experience such moments at the
turning-points of life as I turned into fresh paths. I
have experienced a silent misery at irreparable losses.
Whatever they may have said to me about going down
to the other children, the chief thing I remember is the
khalat* with the strap sewn on to the back, which
they put on me so as to separate me for ever from
the life upstairs, and then for the first time I observed
not all those with whom I had lived upstairs hitherto,
but the chief person with whom I lived and whom I
did not remember before. This was my aunt, T. A.
I remember her as a smallish, stout, dark-haired, kind,
fresh, compassionate person. She dressed me in my
khalat, fitted it round me, fastened my belt, and
kissed me, and I saw that she felt the same thing as
I did ; she felt that it was sad, terribly sad, but

* A long jacket.
15

Biography

necessary. I began to feel for the first time that life
was not a game, but a serious affair . . ."*

Shortly before the death of Tolstoi's father, the
whole family, consisting of four boys and one little
girl, removed to Moscow in order that the eldest son,
Nicholas, might prepare for the University, but the
sudden death of Count Tolstoi, almost immediately
afterwards, left the family in such straitened circum-
stances that they were obliged to return at once to
Yasnaya Polyana, where the children were taught
German by a German governess and Russian language
and literature by a poor native seminarist Accord-
ing to his Aunt Polina Yushkovaya, who was now
responsible for his bringing up, little Le£ had a
petulant temper but an excellent heart, and was given
to playing t pranks of a somewhat disconcerting
character. Between his seventh and eighth year he
was possessed by the strange idea that he could fly
if only he planted himself firmly on the soles of his
feet, at the same time clasping his knees tightly
enough, and he actually attempted to carry his theory
into practice by leaping in this peculiar posture from
one of the top windows of the house, with the
inevitable result of a broken leg. We also have a
very full and interesting description of his later child-
hood in his first work, "Dyetsvo" (" Childhood "),
published in a newspaper Sovremennik, in 1852, from
which it is obvious that from a very early age he was
an acute and impressionable observer. And here it
may be remarked that nearly all Tolstoi's works are
to a large extent autobiographical documents.

* «• Poslyednie Razskazui i Start," Berlin, 1894.
16

Biography

If Tolstois mother had some of the characteristics
of a saint, as much cannot be said of his aunt and
guardian, Polina Yushkovaya. She appears, from
all accounts, to have been a good-natured, worldly
minded woman, very proud of her great connexions,
and considering wealth and position as the sole means
to happiness. One of her favourite maxims was,
nothing licks a young man into shape so much as
a carefully contrived liaison with a woman cotntne il
faut. Nor were matters made much better when, in
the early forties, young Tolstoi went to Kazan to com-
plete his education. It was usual in those days for
the Russian youths to go direct to the University
from their homes, where the teaching they
got was, at best, very impecfect and perfunc-
tory, instead 1 of, as now, using the Gymnasium
as a stepping-stone to the University. More-
over, the University curriculum of the period
was not of a very superior character. Those were
the iron days of Nicholas I., when an artfully
organized system of repression dominated all things
— education included. Every lecture and every
examination-paper was carefully censured beforehand,
and " even to Archbishops," as the Tsar himself ex-
pressed it, " the whole book could not possibly be
given." Add to this that the University of Kazan
itself was very much below the level of the
Universities of St. Petersburg and Moscow. The
life of the students at the old Volgan city is described
by contemporaries as extremely stormy and scanda-
lous. Princely students kept whole streets in a state
of siege for weeks together by incessantly discharging

17 b

Biography

air-guns from their garret-windows at all passers-by,
and most of the aristocratic students formed exclu-
sive little coteries among themselves which were so
engrossed with really important matte rs like balls,
picnics* dramatic entertainments, and very often less
reputable forms of amusement; that they had very
tittle time left for mere study. Moreover, this easy,
pleasant state of existence came all the easier because
Kazan, in those days* was the regular place of resort
in the summer-time for the county families of the
whole country side, who flocked thither to educate
their sons and find husbands for their grown-up
daughters. The higher classes, all mote or less
closely connected, gloried in a large patriarchal
hospitality, A young bachelor student of good family
in those days need never keep his own table.
Twenty or thirty houses were open to him daily
without special invitation, he had only to pick and
choose. A student, when once in the full swing of
the thing, oould rarely get to bed till five o'clock in
the morning, and rarely rose till after twelve o'clock
at noon. Tolstoi, in the character of "Nikolmka ■
Irtenev* has given us a vivid piece of self-portraiture
as he was at Kazan. A morbid sens itiv eness, a
pitiful lack of moral and mental equilibrium, a con-
suming pride; and a disgust at his own privileged
position which points to a latent reserve of nobility,
is legible in every line of this description, His plain-
ness was evidently one of his sorest troubles. "I
was bashful by nature," he teDs us through the mouth
of his hero; " but my bashfulness grew with the grow-
ing consciousness of my ugliness, . . . and Hkfc

iS

Biography

the fox who made believe that the grapes were four,
I affected to despise all the gratifications attainable
by an agreeable exterior, and tried with all the strength
of my mind and imagination to find delight in a
haughty isolation." The unsatisfying futility of the
butterfly-life he led filled him with a savage
impatience. He could quite understand, be tells u*,
the commission of the greatest crimes, not from any
desire to injure but from sheer curiosity to see what
would happen, from the sheer necessity of doing
something, "There are moments," he says, "when
the future presents itself to our mind's eye in such
dark colours that we fear to face it with the eye of
reason, and try to persuadfe ourselves that there will
be no Future and that there has been no Past At
such moments I can well understand a youth lighting
a fire beneath the very house where his parents, his
brothers and sisters, whom he tenderly loves, are
sleeping; aye, and doing it without the least fear or
hesi t a ti on and even with a smile upon his face" He
was firmly convinced at this time that everyone, from
Us grandmother to his coachman, hated ftffl t and
delighted in his sufferings and he took a melancholy
pleasure in reflecting that this was to be his destined

ttted by all his acquaintance* and allowed to have
his own way in everything, The house of Us
Aunt Yushkovava was *h*> most aristocratic in if***—
and young Tolstoi took case to frequent none but the
best company, absolutely ignoring the existence of
Us pooier breduen in gwy homespun. His habitual
pose was truculent and defiant, ik 6ce contemptuous,

*9

Biography

and he made it a rule never to salute any of
his fellow students who regarded him as a superior
being simply because he wore a magnificent mantle
trimmed with beaver and had a horse and a coachman
at his disposal. Tolstoi himself divided the whole
world into two classes : those who were comtne il faut
and those who were comtne il ne faut pas. The
characteristics of the comtne il faut people were a
correct pronunciation of French, well-kept nails, an
aptitude for dancing and bowing elegantly, and
above all an habitual expression of well-bred con-
temptuous ennui. The comtne il ne faut fas people,
who possessed none of these saving virtues, he heartily
despised, while any person unfortunate enough to
speak bad French instantly kindled within him a
feeling of hatred. The moral tone of the dis-
tinguished circle in which he moved was low indeed.
Looking back upon this melancholy period of his life
at a later day he remarks (in his " Ispovyed " or Con-
fession), that whenever he tried to be morally good he
encountered contempt and laughter, but whenever he
gave himself up to pleasant vices he was applauded
and encouraged. His good aunt, whom he describes
as " the purest of women," frequently told him that she
desired nothing so much for him as a liaison with a
married lady, and it was the dearest wish of her heart
that he should become the Emperors adjutant, wed a
rich girl, and have lots of slaves. Most of his brothers,
according to Professor Zagoskin, showed no sign of
moral restraint (especially Sergius, who subsequently
ran away with a gipsy), with the exception of
Demetrius, a mystical ascetic, who went to the opposite

Biography

extreme, spent half his time on his knees, and could
only be persuaded to go to a ball when the biblical
example of King David, dancing before the Ark, was
urged upon him As for Le^ Tolstoi himself, religion
had so little weight with him at this time that when a
casual companion lightly remarked that praying was
both unnecessary and ridiculous, he cast aside the
habit with as little concern as if he were simply
" brushing a piece of fluff ofFhis coat-sleeve." Under
these circumstances it is scarcely surprising to learn
that he learnt but little of value at Kazan. History
he already despised as " a tissue of legends and trifles
generally unnecessary and often immoral. ,, The
juridical Faculty he despised because all its pro-
fessors were Germans. Finally, he attached himself
to the Faculty of Oriental Tongues, one of the
special features of the University of Kazan, but despite
the extra aid of private instruction, was duly plucked
at his examination. Finally, in 1847, he quitted
Kazan and returned to the family estate at Yasnaya
Polyana, where he resided for the next four
years.

Even now young Tolstoi was painfully impressed
by the wretched condition of the Russian muzhik, and
anxious to ameliorate his lot. " Was it not my sacred
and obvious duty," he cries* " to have a care for these
700 men, for whom I was responsible to God? " His
earlier efforts in this direction, however, were defeated
by the invincible laziness of the peasants and his own
inexperience. It was about this time, moreover, that

* Speaking through the mouth of Prince Nekhlyudov, in " Utr
Pomyeshchika," who is Tolstoi himself.

21

Biogfftphy

his humanitarian theories received a powerful impetus
from a diligent study of Rousseau.

In 1851 Tolstoi received fresh impressions from a
visit to the Caucasus with his brother Nicholas. After
faffing down the Volga through the country of the
Cabnucks* who then were still fire-worshippers, they
settled down on the left bank of the Terek, not far
from Kizylar, in the midst of a simple, unaffected
people, spending most of their tune in shooting
pheasants, hunting wild boars, and wandering through
fen and forest The beauty and variety of the
Caucasian scenery, where, in a few hours, one passes
from the realm of eagles and mow-storms to emerald-
green valleys where the dense oak forests are thick
with azaleas and laurels, where myrtles and cypresses
grow in the open air, and mountain ranges, dominated
by the snowy caps of Elbrus and Kazbek, form an
impressive background, powerfully affected young
Tolstoi Nor was he without strange adventures and
curious experiences. On one occasion he narrowly
escaped capture at the hands of the savage
mountaineers whilst on an excursion five miles from
the nearest Russian outpost, and had to ride for his
life. On another occasion he lost so heavily at cards
that despairing of ever being able to pay his debts he
resorted, in a sudden access of religious fervour, to the
desperate expedient of prayer, and while still on his
knees was interrupted by the arrival of an unexpected
messenger from a friend with a gift of money. It is
to this residence in the Caucasus that we owe one of
the most brilliant and characteristic of Tolstoi's earlier
works 1 "Kavkazsky Plyennik" ("The Captive in

82

Biography

the Caucasus "), a later adaptation of which by Tolstoi
himself forms No. 2 in the present collection.

At this period of his life Tolstoi was an enthusi-
astic hunter and full of martial fervour. He was easily
persuaded to join the artillery, had several brushes
with the enemy, and lived modestly on his pay of
five roubles (ten shillings) a month, till" he had paid
off all his card debts. He passionately desired at
this time to win the Cross of St George for valour
(which is said to have been withheld from him, though
well merited, by the enmity of his superior officer),
and on the outbreak of the Crimean War was attached
to the staff of the Commandfer-in-Chief, Count Gor-
chakov, determined at all hazards to win the laurels
denied to him in the Caucasus. Throughout the war
he distinguished himself, both as an officer and a
soldier, by the most irreproachable valour, realising
his own ideal* of true courage by doing his duty on
every occasion without vain glory or desperation, and
took an active part in the disastrous battle of the
Black River. There can be little doubt that the
rude but salutary lessons of active warfare, teaching
as it does to those who will learn the lesson, the urgent
necessity of complete self-restraint and self-surrender,
had a purifying, ennobling influence on Tolstoi's
character. His comrades, in general, seem to have
adored him. " Tolstoi," says one of them, u with his
tales and couplets, enlivened us all In the fullest
sense of the word he was the soul of our party. When
he was with us, time seemed to fly, and our merriment

# As subsequently presented by Capt. Khlopov in " Nabyeg," and
by Timokhin in " Voina i Mir."

*3

Biography

was endless; but when he was away all our noses
hung down dismally enough." The couplets he com-
posed on the occasion of the battle of August 4th
were sung by the whole army ; but his hopes of obtain-
ing a field-adjutancy were dashed in consequence of
some bitterly sarcastic verses on his official chiefs
which he could not resist writing, and which when
once written circulated in MS. from hand to hand.
It was now, too, that he drafted the first sketch of
his famous " Sevastopolskie Razskazui " (" Sebasto-
pol Tales "), which, even in its rough form, drew tears
from the Empress Alexandra, and induced Tsar
Nicholas himself to remark that " the life of this young
author must be looked after," and to order that he
should be transferred to a less dangerous position.

At the end of 1855, on his return to St Petersburg,
the young and titled "hero of feebastopol" found
all the best houses open to him, while " The Sebas-
topol Tales " gave him the entrie to the leading literary
circles. His earlier works, " Dyetsvo " (" Child-
hood"), first published in 1852 in the Sovremennik,
where it was speedily followed by " Utro Pomyesh-
chika" and " Otrochestvo " ("Boyhood"), though
highly spoken of by Nekrasov and other connoisseurs,
do not seem to have attracted general attention. Now,
however, he was regarded as one of the leading
spirits of that new era of emancipation and enlighten-
ment which coincided with the accession of the Tsar-
Liberator, Alexander II. But Tolstoi was never able
to thrive in literary circles. This was due not so
much to his super-sensitiveness and natural reserve
as to an intimate conviction, which he invariably

«4

Biography

expressed with the utmost frankness, that the cult of
art and literature was mostly affectation and mere
phrasing. He never would believe in the regenerating
influence of mere culture. This was the secret of his
quarrel with his great contemporary, Turgenev, whose
cosmopolitanism, Anglomania, and " gentlemanly way
of regarding literature and progress generally,"
absolutely revolted him- The Russian author, Fet',
who met Tolstoi one evening at Nekrasov's, observed
in him, at the very first instant, " an involuntary
opposition to everything generally accepted in the
department of criticism." In other words, young
Tolstoi refused to believe in the dawn of a new era
of progress in which poets and artists were to be the
priests of culture, and show the people a new and
better way. Such optimistic theories struck him as
mere nostrums* But listen to 'his own account of the
matter. " I began to doubt the truth of the theory
because the priests of this new religion did not agree .
among themselves. I found that we had not made
up our minds on the essential point, what is good and
what is evil, so that we, the sole teachers of truth,
attacked and contradicted one another like so many
Bedlamites." For Tolstoi even now was against every
sort of compromise. He aimed at nothing short of
absolute perfection and at perfection alone. At the
same time the desire to excel everyone in everything
was strong within him Even physically it was his
ambition to be stronger and more dexterous than his
fellows, and he began a course of gymnastic exercises
which even in his old age he was not altogether to
abandon. We are told that on his return to Yasnaya

25

Biography

Polyana his steward coming to him in the morning
for orders would frequently find his master hanging
in flannels, head downwards, on a trapeze, in which
position he would discuss the best modes of sowing
and threshing, the steward accompanying his young
master round and round the room as he turned
somersaults without interrupting the conversation.
Forty-five years later tihe habitual filling of a huge
water-butt for domestic purposes was to be to him
what the hewing down of trees used to be to Mr.
Gladstone.

It was in 1856 that Tolstoi quitted the capital for
the repose and seclusion of Yasnaya Polyana, dividing
his time between agricultural pursuits (ploughing
and sowing his own fields and labouring hard to
better the condition of his serfs) and literature.
To this period belong the novels and romances, -
"Yunost" ("Youth"), "Vstryecha v Otryadye"
(" The Encounter in the Battalion "), " Metel' " (" The
Snowstorm "), No. 1 of the present collection, " Zapiski
Markera " (" The Memories of a Marker "), and " Dva
Husara" ("Two Hussars").

In 1857 Tolstoi went abroad for the first time, and
was away for two years visiting Geranany, in which
he was very much interested, and France. At Paris
he again encountered Turgenev, but the meeting was
anything but felicitous. Writing to a friend as to
his experiences on this occasion, Turgenev remarks :
" I cannot get on with Tolstoi anyhow, our views are
so utterly different" Twelve months later Tolstoi
went abroad again, but between his first and second
foreign tour occurred what he always regarded as the

26

Biography

tragedy of his life— the death of his elder brother
Nicholas, to whom he was devotedly attached, and
who is said to have been the one really intimate
friend, except his wife, he ever possessed Turgenev

describes the elder Tolstoi as u a talented talker and
story-teller, who always lived by himself either in
the country or in quite impossible quarters at
Moscow, sharing everything with the poor/' The
effect of this bereavement upon Let was crushing.
" Nothing in all my life," he tells us, " made such an
impression upon me. Why worry and suffer any
more, I thought to myself, when nought remains of
such a one as Nikolai Nikolaevich? " From hence-
forth the shadow of death falls across his finest pages,
and he is possessed by a constantly deepening
feeling of the futility of life and the emptiness of the
best that it can offer. Even art lost its charm for
him. " Art is a lie, and I cannot love a lie however
beautiful, is his summing up of the whole matter.
It was in this morbidly gloomy frame of mind that
he wrote * Lucerne " and " Albert," surely the most
pessimistic productions of modern fiction.

Tolstoi's second Continental tour was a voyage of
instruction. His alert, receptive, and thorough-going
nature laid all branches of foreign learning under
contributioa First he visited Berlin to attend the
lectures of Droysen and Du Bois Raymond, and study
the Prussian penal system, being a frequent visitor
at the Moabit Prison, where the solitary confinement
system chiefly occupied his attention. He also care-
fully investigated the various trade unions founded
by Schulze-Delitsch, and' made the acquaintance of

27

Biography

the celebrated pedagogue Diesterweg, who struck
him as somewhat " hard and dry." Thence he pro-
ceeded to Dresden, where he diligently inspected all
the principal schools, and paid a sudden and alarming
visit on Auerbach, who happened at that time to
be his favourite author. Tolstoi abruptly intro-
duced himself as Eugen Bauman, one of Auerbach's
characters ; but the author of the " Schwarzwalder
Dorfgeschichten," was more frightened than flattered
by the unlooked-for inroad of the grim, bizarre-
looking young Muscovite, and even Tolstoi's
compliment, "Your books have made me think
seriously of many things," did not immediately
reassure him At first Auerbach seems to have
taken him for a peasant from some remote village
who had come either to abuse or to blackmail him
for defamation of character. Passing from Dresden
to Kissingen, Tolstoi made the acquaintance of
Froebel, and then travelling slowly through Switzer-
land, Italy, and France, proceeded via Brussels to
London. It was during this period that he wrote
" Tri Smerti " (" Three Deaths "), the last story in the
present collection, " Semeinoe Schasti " (" Family
Luck"), and " Polikushka."

Tolstoi returned from his second visit to the West
full of educational ideas, which he instantly pro-
ceeded to put into practice. He began to publish a
pedagogic journal, entitled Yasnaya Polyana, from
the name of his estate, and started a school for the
children of his peasantry — the first free school that
ever existed in Russia, which was absolutely unique
of its kind. Tolstoi adopted the two-fold principle

28

Biography

that " all constraint is dangerous and argues want of
proper method," and that " teachers ought to consult
not their own convenience but the convenience of
their pupils." Accordingly his pupils were allowed
practically to do as they liked They could come
and go at will, might sit on chairs* huddle into
corners, or stand at the window with their backs to
their teachers as the mood took them, and no
discipline of any sort was countenanced. To interest
the pupils while they taught them was to be the sole
aim of their schoolmasters. This school created
some little sensation in its day. French savants and
experts raised their hands to Heaven in amazement,
and professed they could not understand how order
could be evolved from the midst of anarchy; and
when the school payed their superior insight the bad
compliment of actually succeeding, they could only
explain the marvel by emphasizing the difference
of temperament between lively French children and
the more phlegmatic Slavs. In Russia itself some
of the higher officials were uncomfortably agitated
by Tolstoi's revolutionary pedagogic methods.
The Minister of the Interior, an inveterate adherent
of the old non-progressive school, complained to
his colleague, the Minister of Education (October
14th, 1862), that, in his opinion, the school of Yasnaya
Polyana, and the journal of the same name, threatened
to undermine the very foundations of religion and
morality, especially as the director and editor was
"endowed with a remarkable, I may even say,
attractive literary style." Moreover, laments the
much perturbed official, Count Tolstoi's convictions

29

Biography

are so evidently sincere as to place his motives above
suspicion, so that there is absolutely no getting at
him And yet opinions so eccentric were bound
to mislead the unwary. What then was to be
done? Fortunately, the Minister of Education, an
enlightened liberal, could assure his colleague that
he had carefully examined Count Tolstoi's m e t h ods,
and convinced himself that they were worthy rather
of praise than of censure, and although be, the
Minister, could not say that he agreed with all the
Count's views, he felt bound to thank and was
determined to support him. Nevertheless the school
soon died a natural death. Pupils were at first
attracted by its novelty, but decamped the moment
they felt they had learnt enough, and the attempt to
found fourteen establishments of the same sort in
other jdaces foiled for want of public support, where-
upon Tolstoi abandoned the scheme altogether, and
buried himself in the steppes inhabited by die
nomadic Bashkirs, in order to "breathe fresh air,
drink kumiss, and five the healthy, natural life of
the brute beast*" To this residence among the
Bashkirs we are indebted for that piercingly vivid
story; "How much land does a man want?" which
win be found in toy former volume of selections*
entitled "Tales from Tolstoi"

Tolstoi presently exchanged the rough hospitality
of the nomadic Bashkirs for the comfort of a home of
his own. On September 23rd, 1862, he married Sophia
Behr, the second daughter of a Moscow physician.
The bride was eighteen, the groom four-afld-tfatrty,
and at first the lady was not only indifferent to her

30

Biography

wooer, but took no pains to conceal the fact It
seems to have been a point of honour with the Behr
family that the three daughters should be married in
order of seniority, and they took it quite amiss when
Tolstoi, passing over the eldest daughter, set his heart
upon the second. The gentleman's final declaration,
which was ultimately successful, is minutely described
in "Anna Karenina," where Kitty Shcherbatskaya
is Miss Behr, while Tolstoi has described himself to
the life in the character of Levin. This union proved
to be of the happiest, and was blessed with nine
children, five boys and four girls, the youngest of
whom was born in 1891. With his marriage the
most joyous period of Tolstoi's life begins. Writing
to a friend on October 9th, 1862, he says: " I have
been married a fortnight, and I am a happy, a new,
an altogether new man. My wife regularly looks
after the cash and the acounts, and I have the bees,
the sheep, a new garden, and the vines on my hands.
Everything goes on pretty well, though of course it
is not ideally perfect My wife is no doll She is of
real help to me." His happiness is so great that it
strikes him as being unnatural, but he consoles him-
self with the reflection that love becomes purer and
stronger beneath the threats of despair! On another
occasion, however, he admits, without reserve, that he
is perfectly happy in his married life. He has dis-
covered that Fanny is not only a loving wife but an
excellent mother; and a helper even in his literary
work. The advent of children of his own gave him
an opportunity of thoroughly applying his pedagogic
theories to the great problem of their education.

3*

Biography

Playthings were banished from the nursery, but the
children were allowed the utmost liberty, being never
chastised corporally, and brought up as closely as
possible beneath the eyes of their parents. Assum-
ing that nowhere was the independence of children
so liberally provided for as in England, Tolstoi
committed his own children, between the age of three
and nine, to the care of an English governess. The
young people were strictly forbidden «ver to com-
mand the servants, but to say "if you please" for
everything they wanted, their parents setting them
the example in this respect The first symptom of
lying was severely repressed by confining the offender
to his room or putting him into Coventry, but the
slightest sign of penitence was requited by instant
forgiveness. The children were always with their
parents except at meal times, or when they retired
to rest, and the servants to whose charge they were
then entrusted, were strictly cautioned to respect
their innocence both by word and deed. We have it
on the authority of one of Tolstoi's housekeepers that
he was a first-rate manager. He saw to everything
personally, negligence and slovenliness were im-
possible under such a master. The smallest detail was
not beneath his notice. His pig-stys, his cowsheds,
andjstable were models of cleanliness. In his pigs
he took particular pride. There were three hundred
of them in all, and they lived in couples in separate
stys. As for the dwelling-house, not a speck of dirt
was allowed to settle there, the walls and floors had to
be washed down every day. He would storm and
rage if the least thing were neglected, and when his

3*

Biography

doctor remonstrated with him on the violence of his
temper as likely to prove injurious to his health,
Tolstoi, like Peter the Great before him, would declare
that it was his nature. " I want to control myself but
cannot," he would always say. His industry and
economy were promptly rewarded by prosperity.
Count Tolstoi's estate was one of the comparatively
few in Russia of the same size which more than
paid its expenses. Yasnaya Polyana was especially
famous for its excellent cream, which sold in the
Moscow market at 60 kopecks (is. 2#d) per pound.
No description, we are told, can give any idea of the
cheerful and attractive life at Yasnaya Polyana during
the first sixteen years of Tolstoi's happy married life
(1 862-1 878). There was no subject, from cricket and
football to the most abstruse branches of philosophy,
in which Tolstoi did not take a lively interest, and
though his acquaintances were few, they numbered
among them some of the most enlightened and inter-
esting men in Russia, including N. N. Strakhov, Prince
Urusov, and the mathematician, A. Fet. As his sons
grew up they became his closest companions. At his
call they would joyfully come running out to join him
in his long rambles (he rarely went a shorter distance
than twelve miles at a stretch), or in a course of
Swedish gymnastics, or compete with him at hurdle
racing, or go a-hunting or shooting. In the winter
the father and sons would be skating or sledging
together, or bombarding snow fortifications of their
own construction. Indeed Tolstoi asked for nothing
better than to pass his days in the bosom of his
family. He hated to be away from his wife and

33 c

Biography

children even for a single day, and hastened back to
them with rapture when the detaining business had
been happily transacted. It was at this time of his
life that an acquaintance said of him that he was
laughing all day long.

But Tolstoi had other and more serious work during
the long winter evenings. It was in the midst of this
period of supreme domestic felicity that his two
immortal masterpieces, " War and Peace " and " Anna
Karenina," were composed

"Voina i Mir" ("War and Peace ") was begun
immediately after his marriage, under the happiest
auspices, and was completed in five years. That
such a stupendous work, a whole library in itself,
should have been composed within such a compara-
tively short time is sufficiently surprising, but our
surprise becomes amazement when we learn that the
author actually transcribed its thousands of pages with
his own hand seven times before he was satisfied with
it With the possible exception of Turgenev's " Otsui
i Dyeti" ("Fathers and Sons") five j'ears earlier
no other Russian book ever created such a sensation.
Despite its obvious defects (defects far less discer-
nible, however, in the original than the translations be
they never so good), prolixity, an almost total absence
of humour and a disposition to philosophize a la
Schopenhauer, under whose fascination Tolstoi lay
at that particular time * " Voina i Mir " must ever

♦ On August 30th, 1869, Tolstoi wrote to a friend : " I have an
indescribable enthusiasm for Schopenhauer, who has given me a
succession of intellectual delights, the like of which I have never
experienced before. I know not, of course, whether my opini ons m ay

34

Biography

rank amongst the few supremely great masterpieces
of the world's literature. It i9 a prose epic of vast
dimensions, the history of the life and death struggle
of the whole Russian nation with its most terrible
adversary the first Napoleon, for the Russian nation
is the real hero of the romance, even the leading
characters, Kutuzov and Platon Karataev, being mere
idealised exponents or representatives of the nation
at large. Yet when Tolstoi forgets the philosopher
in the artist, and condescends to probe the personal
characters of the protagonists in the terrible struggle,
he convinces as no other great writer has ever suc-
ceeded in convincing. The character of Napoleon is
of itself a revelation. A great critic has well said
that after reading the description of Alexander's
interview with Bonaparte at Tilsit, one cannot rid
oneself of the conviction that Tolstoi must have been
concealed somewhere in the same room, for nowhere
else do we seem to see " the little corporal " so vividly
in the flesh as in the pages of " Voina i Mir." The
philosophy of the book, as already hinted, i9 not
without a tinge of Schopenhauerisia Thus, man's
reason, coupled with his exacting egoism^ is held to
be the * source of all human suffering. The main
duty of man is self-renunciation and absolute sub-
jection to the will of the mass of humanity which
makes up the nation. Kutuzov was a great man
simply because he understood this, and had no

not change, but I am confident at present that Schopenhauer is the
greatest of geniuses . . . and I can only attribute his being so
little known to the fact that the world at large is made up of mere
idiots."

35

Biography

independent will of his own. Such a system neces-
sarily postulates the non-existence of separate human
individuality, and, logically pursued, would make un-
conscious instinct the best, because the strongest
force in nature. Even religion is discarded, because,
as Tolstoi plainly perceived, religion strengthens the
sense of individuality by making man self-conscious.
This after all is " Die Welt in Wille und Vorstellung "
in a nutshell. No wonder, then, if Tolstoi's great con-
temporary, Dostoevsky, after reading " Voina i Mir,"
put the book down with the simple remark : " The
fool hath said in his heart there is no God." Yet
Tolstoi himself at a later day was to reject
Schopenhauer's philosophy as inadequate.

Tolstoi himself, at least while actually engaged
upon the work,. was not a little proud of "Voina i
Mir." " I regard all that I have printed hitherto," he
wrote to a friend, " as mere trial-work for my pen."
The first volume appeared in 1867, tihe last in 1869.
The work of preparatory research tried Tolstoi
severely. " You have no idea," he wrote to Fet in
Noveniber, '69, " how difficult the initial labour of
deep ploughing in the field where I am obliged to
sow has been to me . . . ' Ars longa, vita brevis/
I think to myself every day."

After completing " Voina i Mir," Tolstoi set about
writing a romance of the age of Peter the Great, and
began collecting and arranging his materials with his
usual energy and conscientiousness. " Dear little Le fr,"
wrote his wife on this occasion, " is surrounded by
piles of book, portraits, and pictures, and sits reading
and writing and re-writing with puckered brows. In

36

j

Biography

the evening when the children have gone to bed he
tells me of his plans."* But after five years of labour
Tolstoi abandoned the idea altogether, because he
had arrived at an estimate of Peter's character
diametrically opposite to that which generally obtains,
and discovered that he had no sympathy whatever with
the Petrine period itself. " Not only do I find nothing
great in the personality and the acts of Peter I., but I
find that everything on the contrary was very bad,"
writes Tolstoi. " In all his so-called reforms he only
looked after his own personal profit and not after the "
interests of the State. In consequence of his disagree-
ment with the Boyars as to his reforms, he founded
St. Petersburg simply in order to be further away
from them and to live his immoral life more freely?
The sentence I have under-lined is a characteristic
specimen of Tolstoi's unconscious one-sidedness, and
of his inability to do justice to systems antagonistic
to his own. Peter the Great undoubtedly transferred
his capital to St. Petersburg in order to be further
away from his Boyars. But why ? Because he rightly
perceived that reactionary Moscow would inevitably
throw obstacles in the way of the reforms he judged
to be indispensable to the civilising of ignorant and
superstitious Russia, whereas St Petersburg, with the
command of the sea, was a window thrown open to
the humanizing influences of the West The prospect
of greater license on the Neva than on the Moskva
never entered into Peter's thoughts. Peter was
always and everywhere frankly sensual; his strong

* While in the throes of composition Tolstoi demanded absolute
quiet, not even his wife being allowed to interrupt him.

37

Biography

sexual instincts had no rfespect whatever for either
persons or places.

I suspect myself that Tolstoi's real quarrel with
Peter was due to the fact that the great Tsar was
an unanswerable confutation of the novelist's pet
theory of the uselessness of independent individuality,
for if ever a man was superior to his age and his
environment, and moulded them both to his will, it
was Peter the Great And yet there is a moral
grandeur in Tolstoi's refusal to admire the exploits
of the great national regenerator who owed so much
of his success to the unflinching application of mere
brute force. Mere achievement, however impressive,
could never blind Tolstoi to the absence of moral
greatness. We cannot, for instance, imagine him
making a hero of a successful political freebooter like
Frederick II. of Prussia.

" Anna Karenina," Tolstoi's second great work (his
greatest in the opinion of many), was written between
1873 and 1876. The first seven parts appeared
originally in the leading Moscow magazine, Russky
Vyestnik, which, under the editorship of the eminent
publicist, Michael Katkov, was a power in Russia.
When, however, Katkov objected to certain portions
of the eighth part of " Anna Karenina," which was
diametrically opposed to his reactionary views, Tolstoi
was greatly incensed, and cancelled his engagement
with Katkov. " How dare a mere journalist alter a
single line of my work?" he cried Tolstoi indeed
never had any great love for newspapers or gazettes.
"I never read anything but classics/' he once
replied to a person who inquired what he usually

38

Biography

read Yet very few classics really satisfied him. It
was only after considerable hesitation that he allowed
that that incomparable master of style, Pushkin, for
instance, deserved the name of a classic at all, and even
then Tolstoi was never tired of accusing the author
of "Eugene Onyegin" of an excessive lightness of
touch and a tendency to sacrifice truth and even
intelligibility to brilliant and dramatic effects.
Goethe, too, was never one of his favourites.
" Righteous God ! " he cried, with an emphasis that
was anything but profane, " Goethe always forgets
morality in his pursuit of beauty, and without the
former the latter is* "worth nothing." In 1870 he
"Began to study Greek and would read nothing else.
Xenophon greatly pleased him, but he was still more
delighted with Homer. " How glad I am that God
has given me the humour for it," he writes to a friend ;
"I am convinced that of all the truly beautiful, the
simply beautiful which the human mind has pro-
duced, I hitherto knew nothing." Of his own literary
work he was still very proud, and yet his complacency
was not without a tinge of self-contempt In 1876
he wrote to a friend, " I continue under the delusion
that what I am writing is very important, although I
know that within a month the remembrance of it will
be on my conscience. Sometimes I feel myself to be
as a God from whom nothing is concealed, and at
other times I am as stupid as a brute beast." It
pleased him to reflect that he was already numbered
amongst the greatest of Russian writers, and it is
certain that from 1880 onwards he was without a rival
in the national literature. In the fifties Turgenev had

39

Biography

been in the ascendant; in the sixties he had been
obliged to share that distinction with Ostrovsky and
Pisemsky; in the seventies the satirist, Saltuikov,
and the most Russian of all the Russian novelists,
Dostoevsky, held the public ; but five years after the
publication of "Anna Karenina," Tolstoi had dis-
tanced every competitor, and was undeniably supreme.
And, characteristically enough, just as he had reached
the height of his glory, doubts began to arise in his
mind whether, to use a common phrase, the game
was really worth the candle. Except for a very brief
period in his youth Tolstoi had always despised mere
style* and had resolutely refused to cultivate the mere
prettinesses of literature ; but now he began to doubt*
whether literature itself, like art, as to which he had
already made up his mind, was not a vain, worthless,
and even pernicious pursuit. " On reflecting upon the
fame I should gain from my writings," he tells us, " I
said to myself : Good ! supposing you become more
famous even than Gogol, than Pushkin, than Shakes-
peare, than Molifere, than all the great writers of the
world, what then? And I could find' nothing to say,
absolutely nothing. . . . Some indefinable power
drove me towards the idea of ridding myself of life
somehow or other. Indeed, the thought of suicide
became so attractive that I had to use artifice against
it so as not immediately to put it into execution. And
this happened to me when I was completely happy,

* In his youth Tolstoi took some pains to cultivate an elegant and
beautiful style, which is seen at its best in " Kazaki " (" The Cossacks "),
published in 1 86 1. Yet there can be little doubt that his later style, so
noble, simple, clear, poignant, and precise, with a constantly underlying
suggestion of vast elemental power, is far more impressive.

40

Biography

when I had absolutely everything I wanted!: a hand-
some family, ample means, fame constantly increasing,
the respect of my neighbours, health, strength of mind
and body, apparently everything. So long as I fancied
life had some meaning in it, although I knew not how
to express it, the reflection of life in art gave me
pleasure, and it was pleasant to me to look upon life
in this mirror called art But when I tried to dis-
cover the meaning of it all, the mirror struck me as
tantalizing, or as simply nothing at all." This was
in 1 88 1. Evidently a mental and moral crisis was
approaching. Twenty years previously he had been
t^mented by similar doubts, and, after much
torturing self-analysis, had come to the conclusion
that his writings were of no use to the people at
large (in his mind the sole true test of their utility),
and simply the product of egoism and self-glorification.
" It is plain to me," he wrote in 1861, " that the com-
piling of magazines and books, the immense and
ceaseless process of printing and publishing may be
profitable enough for authors, printers, and publishers,
but bring no benefit to the people, and therefore
stands self-condemned." But then he had married.
The happiness of a well-assorted match and a tranquil
family life drew him quite away from all seeking
after a general theory of life, and, as Tolstoi himself
characteristically puts it, " although I considered all
writing to be rubbish, I went on writing, nevertheless,
for I had tasted of the seduction of writing, the
seduction of the enormous literary renown of work
which was really worthless."

But now, after an interval of twenty years, all the

41

Biography

old doubts and misgivings had returned with tenfold
force, and Tolstoi was powerless to resist them.
Utterly dissatisfied with the life he was living, con-
vinced that it was both " senseless and terrible," he
looked about him for something which would better
satisfy his heart and conscience. First he turned to
Science, only to receive an interminable quantity of
dark answers to questions he had never asked, but as
to the meaning of life he did not receive, and of
course could not receive any answer, for Science does
not and cannot occupy herself with such a question.
Next he applied to Philosophy, but Philosophy could
but tell him that the only way out of life was through
death. Finally, he arrived at the conclusion that
Faith was the one mainstay of life — but where was
Faith to be found? To acquire knowledge is easy,
but to acquire faith when you have none within you
seemed well-nigh impossible. In this dilemma Tolstoi
began by consorting with monks and pilgrims, by
frequenting the Optinsky monastery, by shutting him-
self in his own room for private prayer, studying the
Scriptures, and consulting Catholics, Protestants, and
Raskolniks indiscriminately. He even took lessons
in Hebrew from the Chief Rabbi of Moscow — and all
without being able to arrive at any conclusion. " I
had lived in the world five-and-fifty years, ,, he
pathetically confesses, "and during all that time,
excluding fourteen or fifteen childish years, I had
lived as a Nihilist in the completest sense of the word,
that is to say, not as a socialist or a revolutionist,
as the word is commonly understood, but as one
who had no faith, who had nothing. Science and

42

y

Biography

Philosophy tell us that we must go on living as we
are, in the firm belief that, according to the law of
historical progress, after living for a long time badly,
our life will right itself and suddenly become good of
its own accord." We all know how the crisis ended
We all know hov? Tolstoi found peace at last by
resolutely devoting his whole life to labouring for the
people in the spirit of the Sermon on the Mount.
" Live according to faith, and faith will come to you,"
was his eureka. His eccentric, arbitrary, and — there
is really no other word for it — his absurd mutilation
of Scripture, which he was forced to recast in order
to make it fit in with his own very peculiar version
of the Gospels (as to which by the way he dog-
matizes every whit as magisterially as the church
which he so hastily disparaged and which was finally
driven to condemn him), are too well known
to be alluded to here. But however we may
deplore Tolstoi's provocative method of biblical
interpretation, we cannot but reverence the sublime
unselfishness of the life he has led ever since
what we may perhaps call his conversion. From
1 88 1 to the present time, he has literally devoted
himself, body and soul, to the service of his poorer
brethren, the Russian muzhiks, for whom he has
always had an intense sympathy and admiration. He
has done this in two ways, by working among them
and by writing for them. He had always been of
the opinion that " the only really honest labour worthy
of a man was manual labour," and from henceforth he
adopted the life of a common peasant, and worked
vigorously alongside his labourers in his own fields.

43

Biography

"It is better," he observes, with equal wisdom and
humanity, u it is better to help the poor by actually
working at their own handicraft with them, than doing
higher and perhaps more lucrative work, and giving
them the profits thereof, inasmuch as by working with
them you teach them to respect their own particular
work by showing them that you yourself do not
despise it, whereas any money you might give them
would be apt to make them indolent and lazy." So
he set about tilling his own fields, thatching his own
cottage roofs* and teaching his peasantry thrift smd
economy by his own personal exampte. Nor was
this all During the terrible winter of 1891-92, when
whole provinces of the Russian Empire presented the
terrible and pathetic spectacle of an entire agricul-
tural population, overwhelmed by snow, dying in
thousands, without a word of complaint, though
absolutely deprived of food, clothes, or firewood,
Tolstoi hastened to the afflicted districts, and fed
thousands daily at his own expense at improvised
ordinaries, never quitting his post for a single instant
till all danger was at an end Indeed, but for his
indefatigable efforts, whole parishes would have been
depopulated. Nor was this the first time that Tolstoi
had shown himself the benefactor of the people.
Some ten years before, when a terrible famine was
raging in the Province of Samara, which calamity,
apparently for economical reasons, was not " officially
recognised," Tolstoi collected subscriptions for the
relief of the dying peasantry, and, energetically aided
by Katkov and the Moscow Gazette, never ceased
calling attention to the catastrophe till he actually

44

Biography

compelled the reluctant Government tardily to do its
duty and mitigate a disaster it could no longer deny.

But perhaps Tolstoi has done even greater service
to his beloved muzhiks with his pen than with his
purse. Between 1880 and 1896 he composed for
their benefit that series of simple, touching stories, so
truly humane, so deeply Christian, and also, despite
his own intentions, such exquisite masterpieces of
realistic art in the truest sense of the word, some of
the best of which were selected to form my former
volume: "Tales from Tolstoi." We learn from his
letter to Dembinsky in 1886, what moved Tolstoi
thus to cater for the humblest of his readers : " These
millions of poor Russians who just know their letters
stand before us like so many hungry little daws with
wide-open mouths crying to us : * Gospoda* native
writers ! throw into these mouths of ours spiritual food
worthy of you and us, nourish us hungry ones with the
living literary word!' — And the simple and honest
Russian people deserves that we should respond to
its call."

During the years immediately preceding the publi-
cation of these further translations Tolstoi lived for
the most part at Yasnaya Polyana, in the bosom of
his family, working with and for his tenants continu-
ally, and yet finding time to answer daily the
thousands of letters which reached him from all parts
of the world, asking for his counsel and assistance
m every imaginable sort of difficulty. He has been,
with perhaps the single exception of Fr. John of

* Gentlemen.
45

Biography

Cronstadt, indisputably the most popular personage
in the Empire of the Tsar. In the winter he generally
resides at Moscow, frequenting, by preference, chari-
table institutions and working men's concerts, despite
his advanced age taking the liveliest interest in every
question of the day, especially those relating to
religion and morality, and delighting everyone by the
alertness of his intelligence and the generous breadth
of his sympathy. In 1899 the veteran astonished
and delighted the world of literature with his
" Voskresenie " (" Resurrection "), a noble work
(despite its occasional extravagances) from every
point of view, worthy of his best days, demonstrating
that the hand of the master had lost none of its
cunning, and piercing with the divination of genius
to the deepest depths of human impulse and motive.

R. Nisbet Bain.

April, 1902.

46

More Tales from Tolstoi.

I.— THE SNOWSTORM

I.

At seven o'clock in the evening, after drinking tea
I departed from a post-station, the name of which I
don't remember, but I recollect it was somewhere in
the military district of the Don, near Novochirkask.
It was already dark when, wrapped up in my
furs, I sat down with Alec in the sledge. In
the shelter of the post-station it seemed warm and
still. Although there was no snow above us, not a
single tiny star was visible above our heads, and the
sky appeared to be extraordinarily low and black in
comparison with the pure snowy plain stretching out
before us.

We had scarce passed the dark figures of the mills
— one of which was clumsily waving one of its huge
wings — and got clear of the station when I observed
that the road was heavier and more obstructed, and
the wind began to blow upon my left side more
violently and beat upon the flank, tail, and mane of the
hors^ and regularly raise and carry away the snow

47

More Tales from Tolstoi

torn up by the curved shafts of the sledge and the
hoofs of the horsey The little sledge-bell began to be
silent, a current of cold air began to flow from some
opening into my sleeve and down my back, and the
advice of the inspector not to go at all, lest I should
wander about the whole night and be frozen to death
on the road, at once occurred to me.

" Haven't we lost our way ? " I said to the driver ;
and receiving no answer, I repeated the question in
a still plainer form : " Do you think we shall reach
the post-station, driver, or shall we lose our way ? "

" God knows ! " he replied, without turning his
head, " it's only human to go astray, and the road is
nowhere visible, my little master ! "

"Will you tell me whether you think we shall
get to the post-station or not ? " I continued to ask.
" Shall we get there, I say ? "

" We ought to get there," said the driver, and he
murmured something else which I could not quite
catch because of the wind.

I didn't want to turn back, but to wander about all
night in the frost and snow in the absolutely barren
steppe as this part of the military district of the
Don really is, was also not a very pleasant prospect
to contemplate. Moreover, although I was unable to
examine him very well in the darkness, my driver,
somehow or other, did not please me, nor did he
inspire me with confidence. He sat squarely instead
of sideways ; his body was too big ; his voice had too
much of a drawl ; his hat, somehow or other, was
not a driver's hat — it was too big and bulgy ; he did
not urge on the horses as he should have done ; he

48

The Snowstorm

held the reins in both hands as a lacquey does who
sits on the box behind the coachman and, above all,
I did not believe in him because his ears were tied
round with a cloth. In a word, I did not like the
look of him, and that serious hunched back of his
bobbing up and down before me boded no good.

" In my opinion it would be better to turn back,"
said Alec ; " it is no joke to get lost."

" My little master, you see what sort of driving it
is : no road to be seen, and your eyes all bunged up ! "
growled the driver.

We hadn't gone a quarter of an hour when the
driver stopped the horses, gave the reins to Alec,
clumsily disengaged his legs from their sitting
position and, trampling over the snow in his big
boots, went to try and find the road.

" I say, where are you ? " I cried, " have we gone
astray, or what ? "

But the driver did not answer, me and turning his
face in the opposite direction to that in which the
wind was blowing — it had cut him in the very eyes —
went away from the sledge.

" Well, what is it ? " I asked when he had turned
back again.

" Nothing at all," said he with sudden impatience
and anger, as if it was my fault that he had lost the
road, and slowly thrusting his big boots into the
front part of the sledge again, he slowly grasped the
reins together with his frozen mittens.

" What shall we do ? " I asked when we had again
moved forward.

" Do ? Why, go whither God allows us ! " And on
49 D

More Tales from Tolstoi

ve went at the same jig-trot, obviously across
country, sometimes over snow piled op bushels high,
sometimes over brittle, naked ice.

Notwithstanding the cold, the snow on our collars
thawed very quickly ; the snow drift below increased
continually, and fine dry flakes began to fall from
above.

It was plain we were going God only knew whither,
for after going along for another quarter of an hour
we did not see a angle verst post*

"What do you think, eh?" I said again to the
driver ; u do you think we shall get to the station ? "

H To which station ? We may get back, if the
horses take it into their heads to try, they'll take us
right enough, but as to reaching the other station,
scarcely, we might perish, that's all."

M Then turn back by all means," said I, u at any
fate. . .

u Turn the horses round, do you mean ? "

" Yes, turn 'em round ! M

The driver let go the reins. The horses began to
run more quickly, and although I observed that we
had turned round, yet the wind had changed too, and
soon, through the snow the windmills were visible.
The driver took heart again and began to be
loquacious.

"The Anudiuses got into the drifts and turned
back just in the same way when they came from this
station, " said he, " and passed the night by
the haystacks ; they only got in by morning.
They were only too thankful for the shelter of the

* Corresponding to our milestone.

So

The Snowstorm

haystacks ; they might have easily frozen to death. It
was cold, and one of them did have his legs frost-
bitten, so that he died of it three weeks later."

" But now you see it is not so cold, and it has grown
quieter ; might not we drive on now, eh ?"

" It's fairly warm, warm, oh yes ! and the snow's
coming down. Now we'll turn back, as it seems
easier going and the snow comes down thicker. You
might drive if you had a courier, but you'll do it at
your own risk. Are you joking? Why, you'd be
frozen ! And what should I say who am responsible
for your honour ? "

II.

Just then there was a sound of little bells behind us,
the bells of some troika, a three-horse sledge, which
was rapidly overtaking us.

" That is a courier's bell," said my driver ; * there's
one such courier at every post-station."

And, indeed, the little bell of the front troika, the
sound of which was now plainly borne to us by the
wind, was an extraordinarily welcome sound to
hear: a pure, musical, sonorous, and slightly droning
sound As I afterwards ascertained, it was a hunter's
arrangement of three little bells — one big one in the
centre and two little ones adjusted to tierce. The
sound of this tierce and the droning quinte, resound-
ing through the air, was extraordinarily penetrating
and strangely pleasant in that vast and voiceless
steppe.

"The post is in haste," said my driver when the
foremost of the three horses was level with us.

Si

More Tales from Tolstoi

" What sort of a road, eh ? Can one get through ? "
cried he to the hindmost driver ; but the fellow only
shouted to his horses and didn't answer him.

The sound of the little bells quickly died away on
the wind as soon as the post-car had passed us.

My driver must now have felt a bit ashamed, I
fancy.

" We'll go on, sir," said he ; " these people have
gone on before us and have left a fresh track, which
we can now follow. ,,

I agreed, and again we turned towards the wind
and crawled along a bit through the deep snow. I
kept a side-long glance upon the road so as to see
that we did not wander away from the track made by
the sledge. For two versts the track was plainly
visible, after that the only thing observable was a
very slight unevenness under Ae curved sides of the
sledge, and I began to look straight in front of me.
The third verst pole we could still make out, but the
fourth we could not find at all. As before, we were
driving both against and with the wind, both left and
right, and at last it got to such a pass that the driver
said we had deviated to the right. I said we had gone
to the left, while Alec proved that we were absolutely
going back again. Once more we stopped for a
while, the driver extricated his big feet and crawled
out to find the road ; but it was all in vain. I also
made up my mind to get out for once and see for
myself whether that was not the road which I saw
glimmering indistinctly; but scarcely had I taken six
steps forward, with the utmost difficulty, against the
wind and persuaded myself that everywhere were

*S2

The Snowstorm

the selfsame uniform white layers of snow and that
the road existed only in my imagination — than I no
longer saw the sledge.

" Driver 1 Alec ! " I cried, but my voice ! — well I felt
that the wind snatched it right out of my mouth and
carried it in the twinkling of an eye away from me.
I have a very distinct recollection of the loud,
penetrating, and even desperate voice with which I
once more yelled : " Driver ! " when he was only two
good paces distant from me. His black figure, whip
in hand, and with his large hat perched on one side,
suddenly grew up in front of me. He led me to the
sledge.

" Still warm, thank goodness ! " said he, u but it's
bad if the frost does catch you, my little master ! "
said he.

" Let the horses go; we must go back," said I,
taking, my seat on the sledge. " I suppose you can
guide them, driver ? "

" I must guide them."

He threw aside the reins, struck the saddle of the
thill horse thrice with his whip and again we went on
somewhither for a bit. We went along for about
half an hour. Suddenly we again heard in front of
us the, to me, familiar little hunting-bell and two more
besides ; but this time they were coming towards us.
It was the same three troikas returning to the
post-station after delivering the mails, with the fresh
horses fastened on behind. The couriers troika, with
its three powerful horses with the hunting bells came
rapidly forward. A single driver sat on the box,
shouting lustily. Behind, in the middle of the empty

S3

More Tales from Tolstoi

sledge, sat a couple of drivers. I could hear their loud
and merry discourse. One of them was smoking
a pipe, and the sparks, kindled by the wind, lit up
part of his face.

As I looked at them I began to be ashamed that I
had been afraid to go on, and my driver must have
experienced much the same sensation, for we said
with one voice : " Let us go after them."

Ill,

The hindmost troikas had not yet passed when
my driver turned clumsily and struck the attached
horses with the sledge shafts. One of the troika
team thereupon fell heavily, tearing away the traces
and plunging to one side.

"You cock-eyed devil, don't you see where you're
going, driving over people like that? Devil take
you ! " began one of the drivers in a hoarse, quavering
voice.

He was smallish and an old fellow, as far as I
could judge from his voice and his position. He had
been sitting in the hinder troika> but now leaped
quickly out of the sledge and ran to the horses, never
ceasing the whole time to curse my driver in the
most coarse and cruel manner.

But the horses would not be pacified. The driver
ran after. them, and in a minute both horses and
driver had vanished in the white mist of the snow-
storm.

" Vas-il-y ! bring the chestnut hither, we shall never
get them else," his voice still resounded.

54

The Snowstorm

One of the drivers, a very tall man, got out of the
sledge, silently detached his three horses," saddled
and bridled one of them, and, crunching the snow
beneath him, disappeared in the direction of his
comrade. We, with the two other horses, went after
the courier's troika, which, ringing its bell, set off in
front at full gallop ; we just let ourselves go without
troubling any more about the road,

" A pretty way of catching them I " said my driver,
alluding to the other driver, who had gone off after
the horses ; "he'll never catch' em, and he's leading
the spare horse to a place he'll never get him out of
again."

Ever since my driver had begun to go back, he
had become in better spirits and more inclined to be
talkative, which I, of course, did not fail to take
advantage of as, so far, I had no desire to sleep. I
began to ask him all about himself and whence he
came, and soon found out that he was a fellow-
countryman, hailing from Tula country, being a small
proprietor in the village of Kirpechny; that their
land was of very little good to them and had
quite ceased to produce grain since the cholera visi-
tation ; that there were two brothers at home, while
a third had enlisted as a soldier ; that the supply of
bread would not hold out till Christmas, and they had
to hire themselves out to make more money ; that the
younger brother was master in the house because he
was married, while my friend was a widower ; that an
artel, or society of drivers, Went forth from their
village every year ; that though he was not a
coachman by profession he served at the post-station

55

More Tales from Tolstoi

in order to be of some help to his brother; that
he lived here, thank God, on 120 paper roubles
a year, of which he sent a hundred home to his family,
and that he had a pretty good time of it, but that
couriers were veritable beasts, and that the people he
had to do with here were always cursing him.

" That driver, for instance, why should he curse me ?
my little master! Did I overturn his horses on
purpose ? Why, I wouldn't do any harm to anyone !
And why should he go scurrying after them?
They would be sure to come back of their own
accord. And now, he'll only make the horses starve
to death besides coming to grief himself" repeated
the God-fearing little muzhik.

"But what is that black thing yonder?" said I,
observing some black objects just in front of us.

" A train of wagons ! — a nice way of going along, I
must say," continued he when we had come abreast
with the huge wagons covered with mats, going one
after another on wheels. " Look ! not a soul to be
seen ; they are all asleep. The horse is the wisest of
them all. He knows very well what he is about.
Nothing in the world will make him miss the road.
We too will go alongside of them and then we shall be
all right," added he, " and know where we are going."

It really was a curious sight There were those
huge wagons covered with snow from the matting
atop to the wheels below, moving along absolutely
alone. Only in the front corner the snow-covered
mat was raised a couple of inches for a moment as
our little bells resounded close to the wagons and
a hat popped up. The big piebald horse, with

56

The Snowstorm

outstretched neck and straining back, deliberately
proceeded along the absolutely hidden road, mono-
tonously shaking his shaggy head beneath the
whitening shaft and pricking up one snow-covered ear
as we came abreast of him.

After we had gone on for another half-hour the
driver again turned to me.

" What do you think, sir ; we are going nicely
along now, eh ? "

" I don't know," I replied.

"Before, the wind was anyhow, but now we are
going right in the midst of the storm. No, we shall
not get there ; we too have lost our way," he
concluded with the utmost calmness.

Evidently, although a great coward, and afraid of
his own shadow, he had become quite tranquil as
soon as there were a good many of us together and
he was not obliged to be our guide and responsible
for us. With the utmost sang froid he criticised the
mistakes of the driver in front of us as if it had
anything whatever to do with him. I observed
indeed that now and then the troika in front was
sometimes in profile, from my point of view, to the
left and sometimes to the right, and it also seemed to
me as if we were encircling a very limited space.
However, it might have been an optical delusion, as
also the circumstance that, occasionally, it seemed to
me as if the troika in front was climbing up a
mountain, or going along a declivity, or under the
brow of a hill, whereas the steppe was everywhere
uniformly level.

After we had proceeded for some time longer I
57

More Tales from Tolstoi

observed, or so it seemed to me, far away, on the very
horizon, a long, black, moving strip of something ; but
in a moment it became quite plain to me that this
was the very same train of wagons which we had
overtaken and outstripped. Just the same creaking
wheels, some of them no longer turning, enveloped in
snow; just the same people asleep beneath their
mats, and just the same leading piebald horse, with
steaming, distended nostrils, smelling out the road
and pricking up his ears.

4< Look, we have gone round and round and are
coming out by this train of wagons again ! " said
my driver in a sulky tone. "The courier's horses
are good ones, though he drives them villainously, but
ours are so-so and always stopping, just as if we had
been driving all night long."

He coughed a bit.

* Shall we turn off somewhere, sir, for our sins ? "

" Why ? We are bound to arrive somewhere as it is."

" Arrive somewhere ! We shall have to make a
night of it in the steppe : that's what we shall do.
How it is snowing, my little master ! "

Although it did seem strange to me that the driver
in front of us, who had obviously lost his road and
had no idea of the direction in which he was going,
took no trouble to find it again, but continued to
drive at full tilt, cheerily shouting to his horses, I did
not want to separate from him all the same.

" Follow after them ! " I said.

The driver went on, but he drove along even more
unwillingly than before and no longer conversed with
me.

58

The Snowstorm
IV.

The snowstorm was growing more and more
violent The flakes descended fine and dry, apparently
it was freezing hard. My nose and cheeks grew
numb with cold, currents of cold air penetrated my
furs more and more frequently and it was necessary
to huddle up in them more closely. Occasionally the
sledge bumped up against a bare, ice-clad hummock,
from which it scattered the snow in every direction.

As I had travelled some score or so of versts
without a night's rest, notwithstanding the fact
that I was very much interested in the issue of our
wanderings, I involuntarily shut my eyes and dozed
off. All at once, when I opened my eyes again, I
was struck by what seemed to me in the first
moment a bright light illuminating the white plain ;
the horizon had considerably widened , the low, black
sky had suddenly disappeared ; in every direction were
visible white oblique lines of falling snow ; the figures
of the troika people in front appeared more plainly,
and when I looked upwards it seemed to me for the
first moment as if the clouds had parted and that
only the falling snow covered the sky. Whilst I had
been slumbering the moon had arisen and threw her
cold and clear light through the scattered clouds and
falling snow. The one thing I saw clearly was my
sledge, the horses, the driver, and the three troikas
going on in front : the first troika, the courier's, on
the box of which one of the drivers was still sitting
urging his horses on at a good round pace ; the second,
in which sat the two other drivers, who had thrown

59

Mora Tales from Tolstoi

the reins aside and made themselves a shelter against
the wind out of their armyaks* never ceasing to smoke
their pipes the whole time, as was clear from the
sparks proceeding from that quarter, and the third
troika, in which nobody was visible — presumably the
driver was sleeping in the middle of it. Before I went
to sleep, however, the leading driver had at rare
intervals stopped his horses and tried to find the way.
Then, every time we stopped, the howling of the wind
became more audible and the enormous quantity of
snow suspended in the air more strikingly visible. I
now saw by the light of the moon, half obscured by
the snowstorm, the small, squat figure of the driver,
with the big whip in his hand, with which he flicked
at the snow in front of him, moving backwards
and forwards in the bright mist and coming back
again to the sledge, leaping sideways on to the box
seat, and amidst the monotonous whistling of the
wind the alert, sonorous ringing and clanging of the
little bells was audible once more. Every time the
driver in front leaped out to look for the road or the
verst posts one could hear the brisk, self-confident
voice of one of the drivers shouting to the driver in
front :

" Do you hear, Ignashka ! take the road to the
left! You'll find more shelter to the right!" Or,
" Why are you going round and round like a fool ?
Go by the snow ; take the lee of it, and you'll come
out all right!" Or, "A little more to the right, a
little more to the right, my brother ! Don't you see

* A peasant's cloak of rough camel-hair.
60

The Snowstorm

there's something black yonder — some sign-post or
other ? " Or, " Where are you going ? Where are
you going? Loose the piebald nag and go on in
front and he'll guide you to the road straight away.
It'll be much better if you do that ! "

This selfsame person, who was so fond of giving
. advice, not only did not loose the side-horse and go
over the snow to look for the road, but did not even
so much as thrust his nose from out of his arrnyak,
and when Ignashka, the driver in front, in reply to one
of his counsels, shouted to him to go in front himself
if he knew where to go so well, the counsellor replied
that if he had been travelling with courier's horses he
would have gone on and led them to the right road
straight away, " but our horses cannot go on in front
in snow-drifts, not such nags as these, anyway."

" Then you can hold your jaw ! " replied Ignashka,
cheerily whistling to his horses.

The other driver, sitting in the same sledge with the
counsellor, said not a word to Ignashka, and in fact
did not interfere at all, although he was not asleep
either, at least I assumed as much from the fact that
his pipe continued unextinguished, and also from the
circumstance that whenever we stopped I heard his
measured, uninterrupted narration. He was telling
some tale or other. Only when Ignashka suddenly
halted for the sixth or seventh time, this other driver
plainly became very angry at being interrupted by
such leisurely procedure, and he shouted at him :

" What ! stopping again ! You want to find the
road, eh ? It's a snowstorm we're in, and there's an
end of it ! Why, even a land-surveyor wouldn't be

61

More Tales from Tolstoi

able to find the road now. Go on as long as the
horses can drag us ! Never fear ; we shan't freeze to
death ! Go on, I say ! "

" Never fear, indeed ! Last year a postilion was
frozen to death ! w observed my driver.

The driver of the third troika did not wake the
whole time, only once, during a stoppage, the
counsellor shouted :

" Philip ! I say, Philip ! " and receiving no answer
observed : * I wonder if he's frozen ? You might go
and see, Ignashka ! "

Ignashka, who hastened to do everyone's bidding,
went to the sledge and began to shake the sleeper.

* Why, he's drunk as drunk — like a log ! " said he,
41 1 say ! you ! are you frozen ? " he said, shaking
him violently.

The sleeper babbled something or other and cursed
him.

u He's alive, all right, my brother ! " said Ignashka ;
and again he ran forward and again we went on, and
so quickly indeed, this time, that the little brown side
horse attached to my troika, constantly lashed up
from behind, more than once broke into a clumsy
gallop.

V.

I think it must have been almost midnight when
we were joined by the little old man and Vas-il-y, who
had been in pursuit of the stampeded horses. They
had found the horses and pursued and overtaken us ;
but how they had done so in the dark, blinding snow-

62

V

The Snowstorm

storm, in the midst of the barren steppe, has always
remained unintelligible to me. The little old man,
moving his elbows and legs, rode up at a gallop on
the brown horse. The two other horses were
attached to the collar: in the snowstorm it was
impossible to leave the horses to themselves. On
coming up to his, the old fellow began attacking my
driver again.

"Look here, you cock-eyed devil, really if . . ."

" Hie, Uncle Matvich ! " shouted the tale-teller from
the second sledge, " alive, eh ? Crawl in here I " But
the old man did not answer him, but went on with
his cursing. When it appeared to him that he had
cursed enough, he did go to the second sledge

" Caught 'em all ? " they said to him from that
quarter.

" Of course ! Why not ? "

And his diminutive figure, on the trot, with the
upper part of his body bobbing up and down on the
back of the horse, after leaping out on to the snow,
ran forward without stopping behind the sledge, and
scrambled in to where they were, with his legs sticking
up in the air as he forced his way through the orifice.
Tall Vas-il-y, as before, took his seat in silence on the
box seat in the foremost sledge alongside Ignashka,
whom he helped to look for the road.

" You see what a curser he is, my little master ! "
murmured my driver.

We went along for some time after this, without
stopping, over the white wilderness, in the cold, trans-
parent, and quivering light of the snowstorm. Every
time I opened my eyes, there in front of me was the

6 3

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More Tales from Tolstoi

selfsame clumsy hat and back, covered with snow ;
there, too, was the selfsame low shaft-bow, beneath
which, between the tightly drawn leather reins,
and always the same distance off, the head of
the brown horse with the black mane deliberately
bending in the direction of the wind, moved slowly
up and down. Behind its back one could also
see, to the right, the bay side-horse, with its tail
tied up into a bunch, occasionally bumping against
the front board of the sledge. Look down — and
there was the selfsame snow thumping against
the sides of the sledge, which the wind stubbornly
lifted and carried off in one direction. In front, always
at the same distance, the leading troika ran steadily
along ; on the right and on the left everything was
white and twinkling. In vain the eye sought for
some new object : not a post, not a rick, not a fence —
nothing at all was visible. Everywhere everything
was white, white and mobile ; sometimes the horizon
seemed incomprehensibly far off, sometimes com-
pressed within two paces distance in every direction.
Sometimes a high white wall would grow up suddenly
on the right and run alongside the sledge, then it
would as suddenly disappear and grow up in front
only to run further and further off and again
disappear. If you looked up it would appear quite
light the first instant, and you would seem to see
little stars through the mist; but the little stars
vanished from your view ever higher and higher, and
all you saw was the snow, which fell past your eyes
on to your face and into the collar of your furs ; the
sky was identically bright everywhere, identically

6 4

The Snowstorm

white, colourless, uniform, and constantly mobile.
The wind seemed to be perpetually shifting. Now it
blew right against you and blinded your eyes, now it
blew teasingly sideways and flung the collar of your
fur coat over your head and mockingly flapped it in
your face, now it would howl from behind through some
unprotected crevice. Audible throughout was the
faint, miserable crunching of hoofs and sledge-boards
over the snow and the expiring tinkle of the little
bells when we passed over deep snow. Only very
rarely, when we drove against the wind, and over naked,
frozen, stony ground, did the energetic whistling of
Ignaty and the thrilling sound of the little bell with
the resonant, droning quinte come flying, plainly
audible, towards us, and then these sounds would
immediately and pleasantly disturb the melancholy
character of the wilderness, subsequently falling
into a monotonous melody persisting with intolerable
fidelity always on one and the same motif, which
I involuntarily imagined to myself as I listened to
them. One of my feet presently began to grow
numb, and when I turned about a bit in order
the better to shelter it, the snow which had accu-
mulated on my collar and hat plunged down my
neck and made me shiver ; but, on the whole, I was
still warm enough in my well-warmed furs, and a
feeling of drowsiness came over me.

VI.

Recollections and ideas alternated with the most
strenuous rapidity in my imagination.

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The counsellor also kept on bawling out of the
second sledge — I wondered what sort of a yokel he
might be. No doubt a rufus, well set up, with short
legs, I thought to myself, something in the style of
Theodor Filipovich, our old waiter. And then I saw
before me the staircase of our big house, and four
of the men-servants in linen suits, walking heavily and
dragging the pianoforte out of one of the wings.
Theodor Filipovich, with the sleeves of his nankeen
surtout turned up, and carrying a pedal, was running
on in front, unloosening the bars and bolts, and
there he stood, tugging away at a napkin, bustling
about, insinuating himself between their legs and
making a mess of everything, never ceasing all the
time to screech with a funny voice :

"This way, this way, you fellows in front ! Like
this, tail up, up, up, up, I say, carry it through the
door ! Like this ! "

"We can manage it; leave us alone, Theodor
Filipovich ! " timidly observed the gardener, clinging
to the balustrade, all red with the exertion and
supporting one corner of the grand-piano with all his
remaining strength.

But Theodor Filipovich would not be quiet.

"What an idea?" I thought as I deliberated
about it Does he fancy he is useful, indispensable,
or is he simply glad because God has given him the
self-confident, convincing eloquence which he dispenses
with such sweet satisfaction ? It must be so." And
then I saw somewhere or other a pond, a lot of tired
men-servants up to their knees in water dragging a
fishing-net, and there again was Theodor Filipovich

66

The Snowstorm

with a watering-can, running along the bank and
shouting at them, but only very rarely approaching
the water's edge in order to touch with his hands some
golden carp and pour away the dirty water and fill
his can with fresh. And then it was midday in the
month of July. I was walking along somewhere,
over some quite newly mown garden grass, beneath
the burning, perpendicular rays of the sun ; I was
still very young ; there was something I lacked,
something I very much wanted. I was going to a
pond, to my favourite spot, between beds of wild
eglantine and an avenue of birch trees, and I lay
down to sleep. I remember the feeling with which
I lay down : I looked through the pretty, prickly
branches of the eglantine at the black, dry hummocks
of earth and at the translucent, bright-blue mirror
of the pond. It was a sort of feeling of
narve self-satisfaction and melancholy. Everything
around me was so exceedingly beautiful, and this
beauty had such a strong effect upon me that it
seemed to me as if I also were good, and the only
vexatious thing was that nobody admired me. It
was hot ; I tried to sleep in order to get some rest, but
the flies, the intolerable flies, gave me no respite even
here, and they began to collect around me, and
doggedly, thickly, like so many little pebbles, they
darted about from my temples to my arms. The
bees were humming not far from me, in the sun-burnt
patches of the grass, and yellow-winged butterflies, as
if wearied by the sultriness, were flitting from blade
to blade of grass. I looked up : it pained my eyes —
the sun shone too strongly through the bright leaves

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of the thick-foliaged birch tree loftily, but very gently,
rocking its branches above my head, and it seemed
hotter than ever. I covered my face with a pocket
handkerchief. I felt oppressed, and the flies regularly
stuck to my arms, on which a light sweat burst forth.
The sparrows were busy in the dog-rose hedges. One
of them hopped along the ground a few yards from
me, pretended once or twice to be pecking the ground
energetically, and making the tiny twigs crackle
beneath his feet and chirping merrily, flew out of the
bosque ; another sparrow also perched upon the
ground, trimmed his tail, glanced around him, and
then, like a dart, flew chirping after the first sparrow.
The blows of the mangling stick on the wet linen
were audible from the pond, and the sound of these
blows was borne downwards and carried along the
surface of the pond. Audible also were the laughter,
talking, and splashing of the bathers. The breeze
shook noisily the summits of those birches that were
further from me ; nearer at hand I heard it begin
to flutter the grass, and now the leaves of the
dog-rose bosque fell a-quivering and rustled upon
their branches, and now, raising the corner of the
handkerchief and tickling my perspiring face, the
fresh current of air careered right up to me. Through
the opening made by the lifted 'kerchief flew a fly
and buzzed terror-stricken round my moist mouth.
An odd piece of dried twig insinuated itself under my
back. No, lying down was impossible. Suppose I
went and had a refreshing bath. But at that very
moment I hear quite close to the bosque hastening
footsteps and a terrified female voice saying :

68

The Snowstorm

" Alas Batyushka ! What is to be done ? There's
not a man in sight ! "

" What is it ? what is it ? " I ask, running out into
the sun to the maid-servant who ran past me crying
and wailing. She only looked round at me, waved
her hands and ran on further. And now there
appears old Martha, who is seventy years of age,
holding a handkerchief in her hand which she had
torn from her head, bounding along and dragging one
leg after her in a woollen stocking and hastening to
the pond. Two little girls were also running, holding
each other by the hand, and a boy of ten, in his
father's surtout, holding on to the skirt of one of
them, hastened on behind.

" What's the matter ? " I asked them.

" A muzhik has been drowned."

"Where?"

" In the pond."

" One of our people, eh ? "

" No, a vagabond."

Ivan, the coachman, shuffling with his big slippers
over the mown grass, and the fat messenger Yakov,
breathing with difficulty, were also running to the
pool, and I ran after them.

I remember the feeling within me, which said to
me : " Go ahead ! throw yourself into the pond and
drag out the muzhik ; save him and they'll all
admire you so," which was what I desired above all.

" Where is he ? where is he ? " I inquired of the
crowd of house-servants collected round the shores
of the pond.

" There he is, right at the bottom, over yonder, near

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to the bathing-place," said a washerwoman, placing
her wet linen on a drying pole. M I saw him go under,
and then he appeared somewhere else, and then he
disappeared, and then he came up again once more ;
and how he shrieked, c I'm sinking, Batyushka ! ' and
down below he went again, and only bubbles came
up after him ; and as soon as I saw that a muzhik was
drowning I cried out, ' Batyushka, there's a muzhik
drowning ! * u

And the washerwoman, throwing the yoke-beam
over her shoulder, waddled along the narrow path
away from the pond

•* It is a sin and a shame ! "said Yakov Ivanov, the
steward, with a despairing voice ; u what a to-do the
County Court will make about it ! There will be no
end to it ! °

At last a muzhik, with a scythe in his hand, forced
his way through the crowd of women, children and
old men, elbowing each other on the shore, and
hanging his scythe on the branch of a cytisus, very
deliberately began to pull off his boots.

tt Where was it ? Where was he drowned ? " I kept
on asking, wishing to pitch myself in there and do
something or other out of the way.

But they only pointed out to me the smooth surface
of the pond, which was rarely ruffled by a passing
breeze. It was incomprehensible to me how he could
have got drownei ; the water, as smooth, beautiful,
and indifferent as ever, stood above him, glistening
like gold in the midday sun, and it seemed to me as if
I could do nothing and astonish nobody, especially
as I swam but awkwardly ; but the muzhik had

70

The Snowstorm

already drawn his shirt over his head and flung
himself into the water straight away. They all kept
looking at him with confidence and intense expecta-
tion ; but when he had got up to his shoulders in
the water the muzhik deliberately turned back again
and put on his shirt : he did not know how to
swim.

People came running together ; the crowd grew
denser and denser ; the old women held on to each
other, but none rendered the slightest assistance.
Those who had only just arrived at once began to
give advice, made a fuss, and their faces wore an
expression of fear and despair; of those who had
been there sometime already, some becoming tired of
standing, sat down on the grass, and others turned
back and went away. Old Matrena inquired of her
daughter whether she had closed the door of the
stove ; the little boy in his father's surtout violently
flung stones into the water.

But now, barking loudly and looking back doubt-
fully, Trezerka, the dog of Theodor Filipovich, came
running down the hill, and presently the form of
Theodor himself, also running down the hill and
bawling something or other, emerged from behind the
dog-rose hedge.

" What's up ? " he cried, taking off his surtout as he
came along, "A man drowned and all of you
stand gaping here ! Give me a rope ! "

They all gazed upon Theodor Filipovich with hope
and terror, while he, resting one hand on the shoulder
of one of the house-servants, worked off the boot on
his right leg with the toe of his left foot.

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" Over yonder, where the crowd is, on the right side
of the willow, that's the spot, Theodor Filipovich, just
there," someone said to him.

" I know," he answered, and frowning, no doubt in
response to the indications of shamefacedness visible
in the mob of women, he took off his shirt and little
cross, which latter he gave to the gardener's little
boy, who stood before him in a cringing attitude, and
energetically strutting over the mown grass, drew
near to the pond.

Trezerka, who, in doubt as to the meaning of the
rapid movements of his master, had stopped close to
the crowd and, sitting down on the bank, snapped off
several blades of grass, now looked inquiringly at
him, and suddenly, with a joyful yelp, plunged into
the water with his master. During the first moment
nothing was visible except foam and water drops,
which flew right over to where we stood ; but
presently Theodor Filipovich, gracefully waving his
arms and rhythmically raising and lowering his back,
was seen swimming briskly towards the shore.
Trezerka too, snorting and choking, was also coming
rapidly back, shaking himself in the midst of the
crowd and rolling on his back on the shore to dry
himself. At the selfsame moment when Theodor
Filipovich swam up to the shore two coachmen came
running up to the willow with a net wound round
a pole. Theodor Filipovich, for some reason or
other, lifted up his hands, sneezed once, twice,
thrice, each time spurting a jet of water out of his
mouth, shaking his hair neatly and making no
answer to the questions which showered down upon

72

The Snowstorm

him from all sides. At last he emerged on to the
bank and, as far as I could make out, he was
occupying himself solely with the proper adjustment
of the net They drew out the net, but at the bottom
of it there was nothing but mud and a few little carp
swimming about in it Just as the net was being
dragged in a second time I arrived on that side of
the pond.

The only sounds audible were the voice of Theodor
Filipovich distributing commands, the splashing in
the water of the net-rope, and groans of horror.

" Now, then, put some heart into it and pull
all together ! " cried the voice of Theodor Filipovich.

"There's something this time! it drags heavily,
my brethren ! " cried a voice.

But now the net, in which two or three carp were
floundering, all wet, and crushing the grass beneath
it, was dragged ashore. And then dimly seen through
the thin agitated layer of turbid water, something
white was apparent in the extended net. A groan
of horror, not loud but penetratingly audible in the
death-like silence, ran through the crowd.

" Put a little more heart into it ; drag it on to the
dry ground ! " sounded the authoritative voice of
Theodor Filipovich ; and the doomed man was
dragged by main force over the cropped stalks of the
burdocks and thistles right up to the willow tree.

And now I see before me my dear old aunt in her
white dress ; I see her fringed lilac sunshade so utterly
out of place in this picture of death so horrible from
its very simplicity, and I see her face ready at that
very instant to burst into tears. I remember the

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expression of disenchantment in her face at the idea
that these drag-nets were altogether useless, and I
remember the sick, sorrowing feeling I experienced
when she said to me with the naive egoism of love :
"Let us go, my friend! Ah! how horrible it is!
And you to go and bathe and swim all alone as you
do, too ! "

I remember how bright and sultry the sun was ;
how it burnt up the dry, crumbling earth beneath our
feet ; how it played on the surface of the pond ; how
gigantic carp were hurrying and scurrying near the
banks ; how the smoothness of the centre of the pond
was disturbed by shoals of fishes ; how high in the
sky a vulture was wheeling right above some ducks,
who, quacking and splashing, were making for the
middle of the pond through the reeds ; how
threatening, white, curly clouds were collecting on
the horizon ; how the mud, dragged ashore by the
net, was gradually being trampled into the ground ;
and how, walking along the dyke, I again heard the
stroke of a paddle resounding over the pond.

But this paddle was now ringing just as if the
sound of the paddles was blending together into a
tierce ; and this sound tormented and wearied me
all the more because I knew that this paddle was
a bell and Theodor Filipovich could not make it
keep quiet. And this paddle, like an instrument of
torture, was pressing my leg, which was freezing, and
I awoke.

It seemed to me as if I had been awakened by a

sudden jolt and by two voices speaking close beside
me.

74

The Snowstorm

" Hillo ! Ignat ! Ignat, I say ! " cried the voice of
my driver, " take a passenger ! It's all one to you,
and it's no use my trying to keep up. Take one,
I say!"

The voice of Ignat answered close beside me :

"Why should I be responsible for a passenger?
You've got half a stoop yet, haven't you ? "

" Half a stoop, indeed ! There's a quarter of a
stoop, already ! "

" A quarter of a stoop ! What an idea ! " screeched
the other voice. " Fancy plaguing a horse for the
sake of a quarter of a stoop ! "

I opened my eyes. Always the same unendur-
able, quivering snow blizzard in one's eyes, and the
selfsame drivers and horses, but close beside me I
saw a sledge. My driver had caught up Ignat, and
we had been going on side by side for some timie.
Notwithstanding that the voice from the other
sledges had advised my driver not to take in less
weight than a half stoop, Ignat had suddenly stopped
the troika,

" Let us change about then ! A good job for you !
Put in a quarter stoop, as we shall arrive to-morrow.
How much do you make it, eh ? "

My driver, with unusual vivacity, leaped out into
the snow, bowed down before me, and begged me to
transfer myself to Ignat. I was quite willing to do
so, but- it was clear that the God-fearing little muzhik
was so satisfied with the new arrangement that he
must needs pour forth his joy and gratitude on some
one or other ; he bowed down before me and thanked
me and Alec and Ignashka.

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" Well, there you are now, thank God. And I tell
you what it is, my little master, we have been
wandering about half the night, without knowing
whither. That chap there will bring us in all right,
my little master, and my horses are done up
already."

And he transferred my things with energetic
officiousness.

While they were transferring the things I, following
the direction of the wind, which carried me along, as
it were, went to the second sledge. The sledge,
especially on that side on which the armyak was
hung up over the heads of the two drivers, was a
quarter covered with snow, but behind the armyak it
was quiet and comfortable. The little old man was
lying there with his legs stretched wide apart, and
the tale-teller was going on with his tale : " At the
very time when the general, in the King's name, you
know, came, you know, to Mary in the dungeon, at
that very time Mary said to him : General, I have no
need of you and I cannot love you and, you know,
you cannot be my lover, but my lover is the Prince
himself.

"At that very time," he was going on, but
perceiving me, he was silent for a moment and began
to puff away at his pipe.

" What, sir, come to listen to the tale too ? " said
the other, whom I have called the Counsellor.

" You are having a rare fine time of it," said I. " It
passes the time anyhow and prevents one from
brooding."

" But tell me, do you know where we are now ? "
76

The Snowstorm

This question did not appear to please the drivers.

"Where? Who can make that out? We may
be going right away to the Calmucks," answered the
Counsellor.

" But what shall we do then ? "

" Do ? We must go on, and perhaps we shall get
through," said he surlily.

" And what if we don't get through, and the horses
stop in the snow ? What then ? "

" What then ? Why, nothing."

" We might be frozen."

" It's possible, certainly, for we cannot see any
ricks, which means that we're going right into the
Calmuck country. The first thing to do is to look
at the snow."

" And aren't you at all afraid of being frozen ? n
asked the old man, with a tremulous voice.

Notwithstanding that he was making merry with
me, it was plain that he was all of a tremble to the
very last bone.

"Well, it's pretty cold," I said.

" Alas, for you, sir ! If you were only like me ; no,
no, run along, that will make you warm."

"First of all, we ought to show him how to run
after the sledge," said the Counsellor.

VII.

" Ready if you please," bawled Alec to me from
the sledge in front.

The snowstorm was so violent that only with the
utmost exertion, bending right forward and grasping

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with both hands the folds of my mantle, was I able to

traverse the few yards which separated me from the

sledge, through the shifting snow, which the wind

carried away from under my very feet My former

driver was already on his knees in the midst of the

empty sledge, but seeing me, he took off his large hat,

whereupon the wind furiously lifted his long locks on

high, and he began asking me for vodka. He evidently

didn't expect to get it, for he was not a bit offended

at my refusal. He even thanked me, put on his

hat, and said to me : " Well, God be with you, sir,

and seizing the reins and smacking his lips, he

departed from us immediately afterwards, Ignashka

meanwhile waving his arms with all his might and

shouting at his horses. Again the crunching of

hoofs and the jangling of the little sledge bells

superseded the whining of the wind, which was

particularly audible whenever we stopped short.

For a quarter of an hour after the transfer I did not
sleep, and amused myself by studying the figures of
the new driver and the horses. Ignashka had all the
ways of a young man ; he was perpetually springing
up, waving his arms, with his whip dangling over the
horses, shouting at them, shifting from one foot to
the other, bending forward from time to time, and
readjusting the reins of the thill horse, which had a
tendency perpetually to shift to the right He was
not big, but well put together apparently. Above
his short pelisse he wore an ungirdled artnyak, the
collar of which was almost entirely thrown back,
leaving the neck quite bare; his boots were not of
t but of leath ^, and his hat, which he was
78

The Snowstorm

incessantly doffing and setting right, was a smallish one.
In all his movements was observable not merely
energy, but, as it seemed to me, the longing to stimulate
this energy. But the further we went and the more
frequently he pulled himself together, and bounded
on to the box-seat and fidgeted about with his feet
and conversed with me and Alec, the more it
seemed to me that at the bottom of his soul he was
sore afraid. And the reason was this : his horses
were good, but at every step the road became more
and more difficult, and it was obvious that the
horses were running unwillingly; already it was
necessary to whip them up a bit, and the thill horse, a
good, big, shaggy beast, had stumbled once or twice,
although, immediately afterwards, terror-stricken, it
tore on ahead again, bowing its shaggy head almost
lower than the very sledge bell. The right-hand-side
horse, which I watched involuntarily, together with the
long leather cluster of the reins, jolting and plunging
on the field-side, was visibly breaking away from the
traces and required a touch of the whip, but, as is
the way with good horses, even when excited, as if
sorry for his weakness, he angrily lowered and raised
his head, again readjusting the bridle. It was really
terrible to see how the snowstorm and the cold were
increasing ; how the horses were getting weaker. The
road was become worse and worse, and we
absolutely did not know where we were or whither
we were going. We were no longer sure of reaching,
I will not say a posting station, but even a place
of refuge — and it was ridiculous and terrible to
hear how the sledge-bell kept on ^tinkling so

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unconcernedly and merrily, and how Ignashka bois-
terously and bravely shouted at the horses as if we
were rolling away to church on a hard-frozen, sunny,
rustic road at midday on the " Feast of the
Epiphany," and especially terrible it was to think
that we were driving continually and driving rapidly
nobody knew whither, right away from the place
where we were. Ignashka began to sing some song
or other, in a villainous falsetto indeed, but so
sonorously and with such long pauses, during which
he fell a-whistling, that it was strange to feel timid
while you listened to him.

" Hie, hie ! What a throat you've got, Ignat ! "
sounded the voice of the Counsellor; "do stop for a
# bit."

"What?"

" Sto-o-o-op ! "

Ignat stopped. Again all was silent, and the wind
howled and whined, and the whirling snow began to
fall more thickly into the sledge. The Counsellor
came to us.

"Well, what is it?"

" What, indeed ! Whither are we going ? "

11 Who knows!"

"Our feet are frozen, eh! why are you clapping
your hands ? "

" We are quite benumbed."

"And as for you," this to Ignat, "just turn out and
stir your stumps and see if there isn't a Calmuck
encampment about here : it will warm up your feet a
bit ! "

" All right ! hold the horses. Now for it."
80

The Snowstorm

And Ignat ran off in the direction indicated.

" One always ought to look out and pick one's way,
you'll find it's all right ; and, besides, there's such a
thing as foolish driving," said the Counsellor to me.
" Just see how the horses are steaming."

All this time Ignat was gone, and this lasted so
long that I was beginning to be afraid that he would
lose himself altogether. The Counsellor, in the
calmest, most self-confident tone of voice, explained to
me how people ought to act in a snowstorm ; he said
that the best thing of all was to outspan the horse
and let her go right on, God only knows where, or
sometimes it was possible to see and go by the stars,
and he added that if he had gone on before as a
pioneer, we should long ago have reached the station.

" Well, how is it ? " he asked Ignat, who could now
be seen returning, walking with the utmost difficulty,
being up to his knees in snow.

" Yes, it's there right enough. I can make out a
Calmuck encampment," answered Ignat, puffing and
blowing, " but which it is I don't know. We ought,
my brother, to be going straight towards the
Prolgovsky Manor House. We ought to go more to
the left"

"But why this delay? It must be those
encampments of ours which are behind the post-
station ! " exclaimed the Counsellor.
. "But I say it is not !"

" What I've seen I know : it'll be what I say and
not the Tomushenko lot We must keep going more
to the right all along. We shall be out on the great
bridge presently ; it is only eight versts off."

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" But I say it is not I tell you I've just seen it"
answered Ignat angrily.

11 Ah, my brother, and you a driver too ! "

" Driver be hanged I Go yourself I "

11 Why should I go when I know already ? "

It was plain that Ignat was very angry. Without
answering, he leaped upon the box-seat and drove on
further.

" You see how your feet grow numb if you don't
warm them a bit," he said to Alec, continuing to
hug his arms more and more frequently and wipe
and shake off the snow which kept pouring into the
leg of his boot.

I had a frightful desire to go to sleep.

VIII.

" Can it be possible that I am already freezing to
death ? " I thought in the midst of my slumbers.
Freezing to death always begins during slumber,
they say . Why, it would be better to be drowned
than to freeze and let myself be drawn out in a net,
yet 'tis all one whether I drown or freeze if only
this stick — it seems to be a stick — were not beating
against my back and I could lose consciousness.

And for a second or so I did lose consciousness.

"Yet, how will all this end?" I suddenly said
within my mind, opening my eyes for a moment and
glancing at the white expanse ; " how will all this end
if we do not find the ricks and the horses stop, which
will happen pretty soon ? We shall all be frozen."
I confess that although a little afraid, the wish that

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The Snowstorm

something extraordinary, something tragical, might
happen to us was stronger within me than my tiny
bit of fear. It seemed to me that it would not be
half bad if, by the morning, the horses were to drag
us into some distant, unknown village half frozen ;
or, better still, some of us perhaps might be frozen
to death outright And in this mood a vision pre-
sented itself before me, with extraordinary rapidity
and vividness. ThQ horses stopped ; the snow
heaps grew bigger, and bigger, and now only the
shaft-bow and the ears of the horses were visible ;
but suddenly Ignashka appeared* on the surface with
his troika and drove past us. We implored him with
shrieks and yells to take us, but our cries were
carried away by the wind, and there were no
voices at all. Ignashka smoked slightly ; shouted at
his horses ; whistled a bit, and vanished from our
eyes into some deep abyss of drifted snow. Then
the little old man leaped to the surface and began
waving his arms, and wanted to spring off, but could
not move from the spot; my old driver, with the
large hat, flung himself upon him, dragged him to
the ground, and trampled him in the snow. " You
old sorcerer," he shrieked, " you curser ; we'll sink or
swim together." But the little old man burrowed in -
the snow drift with his head ; he was not so much a
little old man as a hare, and he slipped away from us.
All the dogs came leaping after him. The
counsellor, who was Theodor Filipovich, said that we
should all sit round in a circle, and that it didn't
matter a bit if the snow covered us, it would make us
warm. And, indeed, we were very warm and

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comfortable, only we wanted something to drink. I
got a case bottle, served out rum and sugar to them
all, and drank myself with great satisfaction. The
tale-teller was telling some tale about the rainbow —
and above us, indeed, was a ceiling of snow and
rainbow. "And now let each of us take his
apartment in the snow and go to sleep," said I. The
snow was warm and soft like fur. I made a room for
myself, and was about to go into it, but Theodor
Filipovich, who saw some money in my case bottle,
said : " Stop, give me the money ; it's all one if we
die!" and caught me by the leg. I gave him the
money, merely asking them to let me out ; but
they would not believe it was all the money I had,
and wanted to kill me. I caught the arm of the
old man and, with unspeakable delight, began to kiss
it. The arm of the little old man was fresh and
smooth. At first he tore it away from me, but
afterwards he let me have it, and even began
caressing me with the other arm. But Theodor
Filipovich drew near and threatened me. I ran into
my room, but it was not a room, but a long white
corridor, and something held me by the leg. I tore
myself away, but in the hands of him who held me
remained my clothing and part of my skin ; but I
only felt cold and bashful, and all the more bashful
because my aunt, with her sunshade, and with her
homoeopathic pharmacopoeia under her arm, was
coming towards me with the drowned man. They
were laughing, and did not understand the signs I was
making to them. I threw myself into the sledge,
and my feet were dragging along the snow ; but the

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The Snowstorm

little old man pursued me, waving his arms. The
little old man was already close to me when I heard
two little bells, and knew that I was safe if I could
get to them. The little bells sounded more and
more violently, but the little old man caught me up,
and fell like a beast on my face, so that the bells
were scarce audible. I again seized his arm and
began to kiss it, but the little old man was not the
little, old man, but the man who had been drowned,
and he cried out: "Stop, Ignashka, these are the
Akhmetkin ricks, I think ; go and see ! "

This was too terrible ; far better to wake up ! I
opened rny eyes. The wind had flapped my face
with the corner of Alec's mantle ; my knee was
uncovered ; we were going over a bare, frozen crest
of snow, and the tierce of the little bells was very
faintly audible in the air, along with the jangling
quinte.

I looked to see where the rick was, but instead of
the ricks, I saw with my wide-open eyes a house
with a balcony and the crenelated wall of a fortress.
It interested me very little to look at this house and
fortress ; my chief desire was to see again the white
corridor along which I had run to hear the sound of
the church bell, and to kiss the hand of the old man.
I again closed my eyes and went to sleep.

IX.

I slept deeply ; but the tierce of the bell was
audible the whole time, and there appeared to me in
my dreams, sometimes in the shape of a dog, which

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barked and fell upon me ; and sometimes as an
organ, in which I was one of the pipes ; sometimes
the shape of French verses which I was composing.
Sometimes it seemed to me as if this tierce was some
instrument of torture continually squeezing my
right heel. This was so violent that I woke,
and opened my eyes 9 rubbing my foot. It was
beginning to be frost-bitten. The night was just the
same as before — bright The selfsame sort of
movement was jolting me and the sledge ; the
selfsame Ignashka was sitting on the box-seat and
shuffling about with his feet ; the selfsame side horse,
distending its neck and scarce lifting its feet, was
trotting along over the deep snow ; the little tassel of
the harness was jumping up and down, and lashing
the belly of the horse. The head of the thill horse,
with dishevelled mane, the distended and loosening
harness attached to the shaft-bow, was gently rocking
up and down. But all this, far more than before, was
covered, was loaded with snow. The snow came
whirling down from in front, and sideways, was
beginning to cover up the sledge-boards ; the legs of
the horses were up to their knees in snow, and the
snow was pouring down from above upon our collars
and hats. The wind was now from the right, and
now from the left, and played with our collars, with
the flap of Ignashka's armyak^ and with the mane of
the thill horse, and howled above the shaft-bow and
in the shafts.

It had become frightfully cold ; and scarcely had I
wriggled myself free of my collar, than the frozen,
dry snow, whirling along, fell full upon my eye-

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The Snowstorm

lashes, nose, mouth, and flopped down my neck. All
round about everything was white, bright, and snowy ;
there was nothing to be seen anywhere but turbid
light and snow. I became seriously alarmed.
Aleshka was asleep at my feet in the very bottom of
the sledge, the whole of his back was covered by a
thick layer of snow. Ignashka I did not see ; he was
tugging at the reins, shouting to the horses, and
shuffling with his feet perpetually. The little bell
sounded as strangely as ever. The horses kept
snorting, yet on they ran, stumbling more and more
frequently, and somewhat more softly. Ignashka
again leaped up, waved his sleeves, and began
singing his song in a thin, tense voice. Without
finishing it he stopped the troika, threw the reins on
to the upper part of the sledge, and dismounted.
The wind was howling furiously, the snow, pouring
down as if from a sieve, covered the skirt of his
pelisse. I looked around, the third troika was no
longer behind us, it had stopped somewhere. Round
the second troika, which was visible through a
snowy mist, I could see how the little old man was
hopping about from foot to foot. Ignashka took
three steps away from the sledge, sat down in the
snow, ungirded himself, and set about taking off his
shoes.

" What are you doing ? " I asked.

"I must change my boots, my feet are quite
frozen," he answered, continuing what he was doing.

It had made me cold merely to wriggle my neck free
of my collar. I could not bear to look on and see him
do this. I sat stiff and upright, looking at the side

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More Tales from Tolstoi

horse which, drawing back its feet, began wearily, like
a sick thing, twitching its tucked-up tail all covered
with snow. The jolt which Ignat had given to the
sledge, when he leaped upon the sledge-ledge, had
awakened me.

" I say, where are we now ? " I asked ; " shall we
ever get anywhere ? "

" Be easy, we shall manage it," he answered ; " the
great thing is to keep the feet warm. That's why
Fve changed my boots."

And off he started. The little bell sounded, the
sledge again began to swing along, and the wind
whistled beneath the curved sides of the sledge.
And once more we set off swimming in a limitless sea
of snow.

X.

I slept soundly. When Alec, knocking me
with his foot, awoke me, and I opened my eyes, it
was already morning. It appeared to me to be
colder than in the night. No snow was coming
down from above ; but a strong, dry wind continued
to carry the snow-dust across the plain and especially
beneath the hoofs of the horses and the sledge-
curves. The sky, to the right, in the east, was
heavy and of a dark bluish colour ; but bright,
orange-red, strips were becoming more and more
plainly distinguishable in it. Above our heads,
from behind the fugitive, white, faintly tinted clouds,
a pale blue was revealing itself; to the left, the masses
of cloud were bright, light, and mobile. All around,

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The Snowstorm

as far as the eye could reach, lay white, deep snow,
distributed in heaps and layers. In one direction
could be seen a greyish heap, over which a fine, dry,
snowy dust was doggedly flying. Not a single trace
of a sledge, or a human being, or an animal was
anywhere visible. The outlines and colours of the
back of the driver and the horses showed out clearly,
and even sharply, against the white background.
The rim of Ignashka's dark blue hat, his collar, his
hair, and even his boots were white. The sledges
were completely covered. The whole right part of
the head of the dark grey thill horse and his forelock
were covered with snow ; my side horse was
enwrapped in it up to the knees, and his sweating
body was all plastered with snowy festoons on the
right side. The tassel was still bobbing up and down
as before, beating time to some unimaginable motifs
and the side horse was running along just as before,
only she had sunk lower in the snow, from which she
raised and disengaged her body from time to time. It
was plain from her dejected ears what she must be
suffering. Only a single new object riveted our
attention, and this was a verst post, from which the
snow was being strewn on the ground, around which
the wind had piled a whole hillock of snow to the
right, and was still tearing up and casting the
scattering snow from one side to the other. I was
amazed that we had been driving along the whole
night with single horses for twenty hours, not
knowing whither, and without stopping, and yet had
managed somehow to arrive. Our little bell was
sounding more merrily than ever. Ignat wrapped

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More Tales from Tolstoi

himself up tighter, and kept shouting at the horses ;
behind us neighed the horses and jingled the bells of
the troika of the little old man and the counsellor ;
but the sleeper must have parted from us in the
steppe. After going along for another half verst we
came upon the recent track of a sledge and troika,
lightly powdered with snow, and, at rare intervals,
pink patches of the blood of a horse which, as we
could see, had been cruelly whipped.

"That is Philip. It is plain that he has got in
before us ! " said Ignashka.

But there stood a little house with a signboard
alone on the road, in the midst of the snow, which
reached almost up to the roof and windows. Near the
inn stood a troika of three grey horses, crisp with
sweat, with disengaged feet and dejected heads.
Around the door the snow had been cleared away,
and there stood a shovel, but from the roof the
howling wind was still sweeping and whirling the
snow.

From out of the door, at the sound of our bells,
emerged a big, good-looking, rod-faced driver with a
glass of wine in his hand, shouting something.
Ignashka turned to me and asked permission to
stop. Then for the first time I saw his face.

XL

His face was not darkish, dry, and straight-nosed,
as I had expected, judging from his hair and
physique. It was a round, merry, absolutely sun-
burnt face, with a large mouth and brightly shining,

90

The Snowstorm

round blue eyes. His cheeks and neck were as red
as rubbed rags ; his eyebrows, long eye-lashes, and
the hair symmetrically covering the lower part of his
face, were clotted with snow and quite white. It was
only half a verst to the station, and we stopped.

" Only be as quick as you can," I said.

"In one moment," answered Ignashka, and leaping
from the bcx-seat, he ran to Philip.

" Give it here, my brother," taking off his glove
and pitching it in the snow along with his whip, and,
throwing back his head, he swallowed the proffered
dram of vodka at a single gulp.

The innkeeper, most probably a discharged
Cossack, came out of the door with a demi-stoop in
his hand.

" Who's to have it ? " said he.

Tall Vas-il-y, a leanish, red-bearded muzhik, with
a goatee beard, and the counsellor, a stout, white
eye-browed fellow, with a thick white beard framing
his red face, both came up and had a glass or two.
The little old man would also have liked to have
joined the group of drinkers, but he was not invited
to have a dram, and he went to his horses, which
were tied up behind the troika, and began to stroke
them on the back and buttocks. The little old man
was just as I had imagined him, a thin, little fellow
with a wrinkled, bluish face, a sparse beard, a sharp
nose, and stumpy yellow teeth. He wore a driver's
hat, which was quite new, but his meagre litttle demi-
pelisse, threadbare, stained with tar and torn at the
shoulder and sides, did not cover his knees, and his
hempen lower garment was stuffed into his huge felt

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boots. He was all bent and wrinkled, and his face
and knees were quivering ; he was busying himself
about the sledge, with the obvious endeavour of
getting warm.

" Hillo, Matvich ! why don't you have a half pint ?
fine thing for making you warm ! " said the counsellor.

Matvich persisted in what he was doing. He put
the harness of his horses to rights, put the low shaft
right also and came to me.

" Look here, sir ! " said he, taking his hat from off
his grey hairs and bowing low, " all night long we've
been wandering about with you, seeking the road ; if
only now you would stand a half pint Yes, indeed,
little father, your excellency ! And there's nothing
like that for warming one," he added with an
obsequious smile.

I gave him a quarter-rouble. The innkeeper
brought out a half-pint and handed it to the little
old man. He drew off the whip-glove and extended
a small, dark, crooked and slightly bluish hand
towards the glass ; but his thumb, which looked
like 'some one else's, refused to obey him ; he could
not hold the glass, and, spilling the vodka, cast it upon
the snow.

All the drivers began to laugh.

" Just look, Matvich is so frost-bitten that he cannot
hold^his wine."

But Matvich was very angry that the wine was
spilled. However, they filled him another glass and
poured it into his mouth. Immediately he became
very lively and merry, ran into the inn, lighted his
pipe, began to simper, and show his worn, yellow

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The Snowstorm

teeth, and uttered an oath at every word. After
drinking a final dram, the drivers dispersed to their
various troikas and we proceeded. The snow was
just as white and glaring as ever, so that it stung the
eye that gazed at it. The orange and reddish strips
of cloud, mounting higher and higher, and growing
ever brighter and brighter, spread over the sky ; even
the red sphere of the sun appeared on the horizon in
the midst of dove-coloured clouds, the azure of the
sky grew ever more dazzling and deeper. On the
road, near the posting station, the track was clear,
precise, and yellowish ; here and there were holes ; in
the frozen, compressed air there was a sensation of
pleasant lightness and freshness. My troika ran very
swiftly. The head of the thill horse and her neck,
with the mane spread widely over the shaft-bow,
bobbed rapidly up and down, almost in one place ;
beneath sounded the pleasant bells whose tongues no
longer beat, but rubbed against their sides. The good
side horses, tugging together at the congealed and
crooked reins, energetically bounded forward ; the
tassels kept bumping away beneath their very bellies
and hindmost harness. Occasionally the side horse
would stumble into one of the holes in the
dilapidated road, and, with its eyes full of snow-dust,
would struggle briskly out of it again. Ignashka
now shouted to his horses in a merry tenor ; the dry
frost crackled beneath the sides of the sledges ; from
behind us came the solemnly sonorous sounds of two
sledge-bells and the drunken shouting of the drivers.
I glanced back, the grey, shaggy side horses,
extending their necks, and breathing methodically,

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with curving bits, were bounding over the snow.
Philip shaking his whip, was adjusting his hat ; the
little old man, with drawn up legs, was lying at full
length, just as before, in the middle sledge.

In two minutes the sledge began to grate upon the
well-swept boards of the approach to the posting-
station, and Ignashka turned towards me his snow-
covered, merry, weather-beaten face.

" We've arrived, you see, sir ! " said he.

94

II.— THE CAPTIVE IN THE CAUCASUS

I.

A GENTLEMAN of the name of Zhilin was serving
in the Caucasus as an officer. One day he received
a letter from home. His aged mother wrote to him :
"I am growing old and should like to see my dear
little son before I die. Come to me, I pray you, if
it be only to bury me, and then in God's name enter
the service again. And I have found for you a nice
bride besides ; she is sensible, good, and has property.
You may fall in love with her perhaps, and you may
marry her and be able to retire."

Zhilin fell a musing : " Yes, indeed, the old lady has
been ailing lately, she might never live to see me.
Yes, Til go, and if the girl is nice I may marry her into
the bargain."

So he went to his colonel, obtained leave of absence,
took leave of his comrades, gave his soldiers four
pitchers of vodka to drink his health, and prepared to
be off.

There was war in, the Caucasus then. The roads
were impassable night and day. Scarce any of the
Russians could go in or out of the fortress but the
Tatars would kill them or carry them off into the

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mountains. So it was commanded that twice a week
a military escort should proceed from fortress to
fortress with the people in the midst of it.

The affair happened in the summer. At dawn of
day the baggage-wagons assembled in the fortress,
the military escort marched out, and the whole
company took the road. Zhilin went on horseback,
and his wagon with his things was among the baggage.

The distance to be traversed was twenty miles,
but the caravan moved but slowly. Sometimes it was
the soldiers who stopped, sometimes a wheel flew off
one of the baggage-wagons, or a horse wouldn't go—
and then they had all to stop and wait.

The sun had already passed the meridian, and the
caravan had only gone half the distance. There was
nothing but heat and dust, the sun regularly burned,
and there was no shelter to be had. All around
nothing but the naked steppe — not a village, not a
wayside bush.

Zhilin had galloped on in front, he had now stopped,
and was waiting for the cavalcade to come up. Then
he heard a horn blown in the rear, and knew that they
had stopped again. Then thought Zhilin : " Why not
go on by oneself without the soldiers? I've a good
horse beneath me, and if I stumble upon the Tatars —
I can make a bolt for it Or shall I not go ? "

He stood there considering, and up there came
trotting another mounted officer, called Kostuilin, with
a musket, and he said :

"Let us go on alone, Zhilin. I can't stand it
any longer, I want some grub ; the heat is stifling, and
my shirt is regularly sticking to me."

9 6

The Captive in the Caucasus

This Kostuilin, by the way, was a thick, heavy,
red-faced man, and the sweat was pouring from him.
Zhilin thought for a moment, and then said :

"Is your musket loaded?"

"Yes, it is loaded."

"Well, we'll go, but on one condition — we must
keep together."

And they cantered on in front alongf the road They
went through the steppe, and as they chatted together
they kept glancing on every side of them. They
could see for a great distance around them.

The steppe at last had come to an end, and the
way lay towards a ravine between two mountains.

"What are you looking at? Let us go straight
on ! " said Kostuilin. But Zhilin did not listen to
him.

"No," said he, "you just wait below and I'll go
up and have a look round."

And he urged his horse to the left up the mountain.
The horse beneath Zhilin was a good hunter (he had
bought it from the horse-fold while still a foal for a
hundred roubles, and had broken it in himself), it
carried him up the steep ascent as if on wings. He
needed but a single glance around — there right in front
of them, not a furlong ahead, was a whole heap of
Tatars, thirty men at least. He no sooner saw them
than he set about turning, but the Tatars had seen
him too, and posted after him, drawing their muskets
while in full career. Zhilin galloped down the slope
as fast as his horse's legs could carry him, at the same
time shouting to Kostuilin :

" Out with the muskets ! And you, my beauty " —

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More Tales from Tolstoi *

he was thinking of his horse — " you, my beauty, spread
yourself o»ut and don't knock your foot against
anything/ for if you stumble now we're lost. Let
me but get to my musket, and I'm hanged if I
surrender."

But Kostuilin, instead of waiting, bolted off at full
speed in the direction of the fortress as soon as he
beheld the Tatars. He lashed his horse first on one
side and then on the other. Only the strong sweep
of her tail was visible in the dust

Zhilin perceived that he was in a bit of a hole. His
musket was gone, and with a simple shashka* nothing
could be done. He drove his horse on in the direc-
tion of the Russian soldiers — there was just a chance
of getting away. He saw that six of them were
galloping away to cut him off. He had a good horse
under him, but they had still better, and they were
racing their hardest to bar his way. He began to
hesitate, wanted to turn in another direction, but his
horse had lost her head, he couldn't control her, and
she was rushing right upon them. He saw approach-
ing him on a grey horse a Tatar with a red beard.
The Tatar uttered a shrill cry, gnashed his teeth,
and his musket was all ready.

" Well," thought Zhilin, " I know what you are, you
devils, if you take me alive you'll put me in a dungeon
and whip me. I'll not be taken alive."

Zhilin was sttnall of stature, but he was brave.
Drawing his shashka, he urged his horse straight upon
the red-bearded Tatar, thinking to himself : " Til

* A Circassian sabre.

9 8

The Captive in the Caucasus

either ride down his horse or fell him with my
shashka."

But Zhilin never got up to the Tatar horse. They
fired upon him from behind with their muskets and
attacked his horse. His horse fell to the ground with
a crash, and Zhilin was thrown off her back He tried
to rise, but two strong-smelling Tatars were already
sitting upon him and twisting his arms behind his
back. He writhed and twisted and threw off the
Tatars, but then three more leaped off their horses
and sprang upon him, and began beating him about the
head with the butt-ends of their muskets. It grew dark
before his eyes* and he began to feel faint. Then the
Tatars seized him, rifled his saddle-bags, fastened his
arms behind his back, tying them with a Tatar knot,
and dragged him to the saddle. They snatched off
his hat, they pulled off his boots, examined everything,
extorted his money and his watch, and ripped up all
his clothes. Zhilin glanced at his horse. She, his
dearly-beloved comrade, lay just as she had fallen,
on her back, with kicking feet which vainly tried to
reach the ground. There was a hole in her head, and
out of this hole the black blood gushed with a hiss —
for several yards around the dust was wet

One of the Tatars went to the horse and proceeded
to take the saddle from her back. She went on
kicking all the time, and he drew forth a knife and
cut her windpipe. There was a hissing sound from
her throat, she shivered all .over, and the breath of
her life was gone.

The Tatars took away the saddle and bridle. The
Tatar with the red beard mounted his horse and

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the others put Zhilin up behind him. To prevent him
falling off they fastened him by a thong to the Tatar's
belt and led him away into the mountains.

So there sat Zhilin behind the Tatar, and at
every moment he was jolted against, and his very nose
came in contact with the Tatar's malodorous back.
All that he could see in front of him, indeed, was
the sturdy Tatar's back, his sinewy, shaven neck
sticking out all bluish from beneath his hat. Zhilin's
head was all battered, and the blood kept trickling
into his eyes. And it was impossible for him to right
himself on his horse or wipe away the blood. His
arms were twisted so tightly that his very collar-bone
was in danger of breaking.

They travelled for a long time from mountain to
mountain, crossed a ford, diverged from the road,
and entered a ravine.

Zhilin would have liked to have marked the road
by which they were taking him, but his eyes were
clotted with blood and he couldn't turn round
properly.

It began to grow dark. They crossed yet another
river and began to ascend a rocky mountain, and
then came a smell of smoke and the barking of
dogs !

At la«fc they came to the aul or Tatar village. The
Tatars dismounted from their horses and a crowd of
Tatar children assembled,, who surrounded Zhilin,
fell a yelling and making merry, and took up stones
to cast at Rim.

The Tatar drove away the children, took Zhilin from
his horse, and called a workman. Up came a hatchet-

ico

The Captive in the Caucasus

faced Nogaets* clad only in a shirt, and as the shirt'
was torn the whole of ,his brea9t was bare. The
Tatar gave some orders to him. The workman
brought a kolodka, that is to say, two oaken blocks
fastened together by iron rings, and in one of the
rings a cramping iron and a lock. Then they undid
Zhilin's hands, attached the kolodka to his feet, led
him into an outhouse, thrust him into it, and fastened
the door. Zhilin fell upon a dung-heap. For a
time he lay where he fell, then he fumbled his way
in the dark to the softest place he could find, and lay
down there.

II.

Zhilin scarcely slept at all during the night. It
was the season of short nights. He could see it
growing light through a rift in the wall. Zhilin arose,
made the rift a little bigger, and looked out.

Through the rift the high road was visible going
down the mountain-side, to the right was a Tatar
saklyaft with two villages beside it. A black dog
lay upon the threshold, a goat with her kids passed
along whisking their tails. He saw a Tatar milkmaid
coming down from the mountains in a flowered-belted
blouse, trousers and boots, with her head covered
by a kaftan, and on her head a large tin kui^ten%full
of water. She walked with curved back and head
bent forward, and led by the hand a little closely
cropped Tatar boy in a little shirt

* A Tatar of the Nogai tribe.

f A mountain hut in the Caucasus.

J An earthen, bulging pitcher, with a narrow neck and a handle.

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The Tatar girl took the water to the saklya, and
out came the Tatar of yesterday evening, with the
red beard, in a silken beshmet? with slippers on his
naked feet and a silver knife in his leather girdle. On
his head he wore a lofty, black sheepskin hat, flattened
down behind. He came out, stretched himself, and
stroked his bountiful red beard. He stayed there for
a while, gave some orders to his labourer, and went
off somewhither.

Next there passed by two children on horses which
they had just watered. The horses' nozzles were
wet Then some more closely cropped youngsters
ran by in nothing but shirts, without hose, and they
collected into a group, went to the outhouse, took up
a long twig and thrust it through the rift in the walL
Zhilin gave such a shout at them that the children
screamed in chorus and took to their heels, a gleam of
naked little knees was the last that was seen of
them.

But Zhilin wanted drink, his throat was parched
and dry. " If only they would come to examine me,"
thought he. He listened — they were opening the
outhouse. The red-bearded Tatar appeared, and with
him came another, smaller in stature, a blackish sort
of little man. His eyes were bright and black, he
was ruddy and had a small cropped beard, his face
was merry, he was all smiles. The swarthy man was
dressed even better than the other; his silken
beshmet was blue and trimmed with galoon, the large
dagger in his belt was of silver, his red morocco
slippers were also trimmed with silver. Moreover,

* A Tatar trader-tunic
I02

The Captive in the Caucasus

thick outer slippers covered the finer inner ones. He
wore a lofty hat of white lamb's-wool.

The red-bearded Tatar came in and there was some
conversation, and apparently a dispute began. He
lent his elbows on the gate, fingered his hanger, and
glanced furtively at Zhilin like a hungry wolf. But
the swarthy man — he was a quick, lively fellow, who
seemed to move upon springs — came straight up to
Zhilin, sat down on his heels, grinned, showing all
his teeth, patted him on the shoulder, and began to
jabber something in a peculiar way of his own, blinking
his eyes, clicking with his tongue, and saying
repeatedly :

" Korosho urus ! Korosho urus ! "*

Zhilin did not understand a word of it, and all he
said was:

"I am thirsty, give me a drink of water ! "

The swarthy man laughed. " Korosho urus ! " he
said again — 'babbling away in his own peculiar
manner.

Zhilin tried to make them understand by a panto-
mime with his hands and lips that he wanted some-
thing to drink.

The swarthy man understood at last, went out and
called :

"Dina! Dina!"

A very thin, slender girl, about thirteen years of
age, with a face very like the swarthy man's, then
appeared. Plainly she was the swarthy man's
daughter. She also had black sparkling eyes and

* I.e. — " Khorosho russ " = fine Russian man.
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a ruddy complexion. She was dressed in a long blue
blouse with white sleeves and without a girdle. The
folds, sleeves, and breast of her garment were beauti-
fully trimmed. She also wore trousers and slippers,
and the inner slippers were protected by outer slippers
with high heels. Round her neck she wore a neck-
lace of Russian poltiniks* Her head was uncovered,
her hair was black, and in her hair was a ribbon,
from which dangled a metallic plaque and a silver
rouble.

Her father gave her some orders. She ran out,
and returned again immediately with a tin kuv-
shinchik.f She handed the water to Zhilin herself,
plumping down on her heels, bending right forward
so that her shoulders were lower than her knees.
There she sat, staring at Zhilin with wide-open eyes
as he drank, just as if he were some wild animal.

Zhilin gave the kuvshinchik back to her, and back
she bounded like a wild goat. Even her father
couldn't help laughing. Then he sent her somewhere
or other. She took the kuvshinchik, ran off, and
came back with some unleavened bread on a little
round platter, and again she crouched down, all
humped forward, gazing at Zhilin with all her eyes.

Then all the Tatars went out and closed the door
behind them.

After a little while the Nogaets came to Zhilin and
said:

" Come along, master ! come along ! "

He also did not know Russian. It was plain to

Half roubles, f A small kuvshin. See preceding note".
I04

The Captive in the Caucasus

Zhilin, however, that he was ordering him to come
somewhither.

Zhilin followed him, still wearing the kolodka. He
limped all the way, to walk was impossible, as he
had constantly to twist his foot to one side. So
Zhilin followed the Nogaets outside. He saw the
Tatar village — ten houses, with their mosque which
had a tower. Before one house stood three saddled
horses. A tiny boy was holding their bridles. All
at once the swarthy man came leaping out of his
house, and waved his hand to Zhilin to signify to him
to approach. The Tatar was smiling, jabbering after
his fashion, and quickly disappeared into the house
again. Zhilin entered the house. The living-room
was a good one, the walls were of smoothly-polished
clay. Variegated pillows were piled up against the
front Wall, rich carpets hung up at the entrance on
each side ; arms of various sorts — pistols, shashki, all
of silver — were hanging on the carpets. In one corner "'
was a little stove level with the ground. The earthen
floor was as clean as a threshing-floor, the front corner
was all covered with felt, on the felt were carpets,
and on the carpets soft cushions. And on the carpets,
in nothing but their bashmaks* sat the Tatars — there
were five of them, the red-bearded man, the swarthy
man, and three guests. Soft bulging cushions had
been placed behind the backs of them all, and in
front of them, on a small platter, were boltered pan-
cakes, beef distributed in little cups, and the Tatar
beverage — buza\ — in a kuvshinchik. They ate with
their hands, and all their hands were in the meat

* Slippers, f A drink made from buck-wheat and oatmeal.

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The swarthy man leaped to his feet, and bade Zhilin
sit down apart, not on the carpet, but on the bare
floor ; then he went back to his carpet, and regaled
his guests with pancakes and buza. The labourer
made Zhilin sit down in the place assigned to him,
he himself took off his outer bashmaks, placed them
side by side at the door, where the other bashmaks
stood, then sat down on the felt nearer to his masters ;
he watched how they ate, and his mouth watered as
he wiped it When the Tatars had eaten the pan-
cakes, a Tatar woman appeared in just the same sort
of blouse that the girl had worn, and in trousers also ;
her head was covered with a cloth.

She took away the meat and the pancakes, and
brought round a good washing vessel, and a kuvshin
with a very narrow spout The Tatars then began
washing their hands, then they folded their arms,
squatted down on their knees, belched in every
direction, and recited prayers. Then they talked
among themselves. Finally, one of the guests turned
towards Zhilin, and began to speak in Russian.

" Kazi Mu'hammed took thee," said he, pointing to
the red-bearded Tatar, " and has sold thee to Abdul
Murad," and he indicated the swarthy Tatar. " Abdul
Murad is now thy master."

Zhilin was silent

Then Abdul Murad began to speak, and kept on
pointing at Zhilin, and laughed and said, several times,
" Soldat urus ! Korosho urus ! "*

The interpreter said :

• The Russian soldier. The fine Russian.

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The Captive in the Caucasus

" He bids thee write a letter home in order that
they may send a ransom for thee. As soon as they
send the money, thou shalt be set free."

Zhilin thought for a moment, and then said :

" How much ransom does he require? "

The Tatars talked among themselves, and then the
interpreter said:

"Three thousand moneys."

" No," said Zhilin, " I cannot pay that"

Abdul started up and began waving his hands, and
said something to Zhilin — they all thought he under-
stood. The interpreter interpreted, saying:

" How much wilt thou give? "

Zhilin reflected, and then said, " Five hundred
roubles."

At this the Tatars chattered a great deal and all
together. Abdul began to screech at the red-bearded
Tatar, and got so excited that the spittle trickled
from his mouth. The red-bearded Tatar only blinked
his eyes and clicked with his tongue.

Then they were silent again, and the interpreter
said *.

"Thy master thinks a ransom of five hundred
roubles too little. He himself paid two hundred roubles
for thee. Kazi Muhammed owed him that, and he
took thee in discharge of the debt. Three thousand
roubles is the least they will let thee go for. And if
thou dost not write they will put thee in the dungeon
and punish thee with scourging."

"What am I to do with them? this is even worse
than I thought," said Zhilin to himself. Then he
leaped to his feet and said,

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" Tell him, thou dog, that if he wants to frighten
me, I won't give him a kopeck, neither will I write
at all I have never feared, and I will not fear you
now, you dog."

The interpreter interpreted, and again they all
began talking at once.

For a long time they debated, and then the swarthy
man leaped to his feet and came to Zhilin.

" Urus ! " said he, * dzhiget, dzhiget urus ! " — and
then he laughed.

" Dzhiget " in their language signifies " youth."

Then he said something to the interpreter, and
the interpreter said : " Give a thousand roubles ! "

Zhilin stood to his guns. " More than five hundred
I will not give," said he. " You may kill me if you
like, but you'll get no more out of me."

The Tatars fell a talking together again, then they
sent out the labourer for someone, and kept looking
at the door and at Zhilia Presently the workman
came back and brought with him a man — stout, bare-
legged, and cheery-looking, he also had a kolodka
fastened to his leg.

Then Zhilin sighed indeed, for he recognised
Kostuilin. So they had taken him too then! The
Tatars placed them side by side, they began talking
to each other, and the Tatars were silent and looked
on. Zhilin related how it had fared with him,
Kostuilin told him that his horse had sunk under
him, that his musket had missed fire, and that that
selfsame Abdul had chased and captured him.

Abdul leaped to his feet, pointed at Kostuilin, and
said something. The interpreter interpreted that

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The Captive in the Caucasus

they both of them had now one master, and whichever
of them paid up first should be released first.

" Look now," said he to Zhilin, " thou makest such
a to do, but thy comrade takes it quietly; he has
written a letter home telling them to send five
thousand roubles. Look now ! he shall be fed well
and shall be respected."

"My comrade can do as he likes," said Zhilin,
"no doubt he is rich, but I am not rich. What I
have said that will I do. You may kill me if you
like, but you will get little profit out of that— I will
not write for more than five hundred roubles."

They were silent for a while. Suddenly Abdul
leaped up and produced a small coffer, took out a
pen, a piece of paper and ink, forced them upon
Zhilin, tapped him on the shoulder, and, pointing to
them, said : " Write I " He had agreed to take five
hundred roubles.

" Wait a bit," said Zhilin to the interpreter ; " tell
him that he must feed us well, clothe and shoe us
decently, and let us be together — we shall be happier
then — and take off the kolodka" He himself then
looked at his master and laughed. And his master
laughed likewise. He heard the interpreter out, and
then said : " I will give you the best of clothing, a
Circassian costume and good boots — you might be
married in them. And Til feed you like princes.
And if you want to dwell together — well, you can
dwell in the outhouse. I can't take off the kolodka — »
you would run away. Only at night can I take it
off." Then he rushed forward and tapped him on
the shoulder — " Thy good is my good ! " said he.

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Then Zhilin wrote the letter, and he wrote no
address on the letter, so that it should not go. But
he thought to himself:

" I'll run away."

Then they led away Zhilin and Kostuilin to the
outhouse, brought them maize-straw to spread on the
ground, water in a kuvshin, bread, two old Circassian
costumes, and two pairs of tattered military boots.
They had plainly been taken from off the feet of
slain soldiers. At night they took off their kolodki
and fastened the door.

III.

Zhilin and his comrade lived there for a whole
month. And Zhilin's master was as radiant as ever.
"Ivan," he would say laughing, "thy good is my
good — Abdul's good" They were badly fed all the
same, getting nothing but unleavened bread, made
from indifferent meal, and tough and doughy hearth-
cakes.

Kostuilin wrote home once more, and waited for
the money to be sent, in utter weariness. The whole
day they sat in the outhousei and counted the days
it would take the letter to arrive, or else they slept
Zhilin, however, knew very well that his letter would
not arrive, and he did not write another.

" Where I should like to know," thought he, " would
my mother be able to scrape together so much money
to pay me out? It was as much as she could do to
live on what I sent her. If she had to collect five

no

The Captive in the Caucasus

hundred roubles she would come to grief altogether.
With God's help, Til get out of this hobble myself."

So he looked carefully about and devised every
possible method of escaping. He would go about
the aul whistling, or he would sit down here and' there
and manufacture various sorts of little things, or
model a puppet out of clay, or weave baskets from
twigs. For Zhilin was a master at all sorts of handi-
work.

Once he modelled a puppet with a nose, arms, and
legs in a Tatar shirt, and put this puppet on the roof
of the outhouse.

Presently the Tatar women came out to draw water.
Dinka, the daughter of the house, saw the puppet
and called the Tatar women to look at it They put
down their kuvskini, looked at it long and laughed
aloud. Zhilin took up the puppet and offered it to
them. They laughed still more, but were afraid to
take it. So he put the puppet on the roof, went into
the outhouse, and watched to see what would happen.

Dina then came running up, glanced all around,
seized the puppet, and ran away with it

Next morning at dawn he saw Dina across the
threshold with the puppet She had already adorned
the puppet with all sorts of parti-colotfred rags, and
was rocking it as if it were a child, singing a lullaby
of her own invention. Then the old woman came out
and scolded her, snatched away the puppet, smashed
it, and sent Dina off to work somewhere.

Then Zhilin made another and-even betted puppet
and gave it to Dina. Presently Dina came again,
bringing with her a little pitcher which she put on

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the floor, and then sat down and looked at Zhilin, and
smiling all over, kept pointing at the pitcher.

u Why is she so delighted? " thought Zhilin. Then
he took up the pitcher and began to drink He
thought it was water, but it was milk. He drank all
the milk. " Khorosho ! "* said he. How rejoiced
Dina was then!

"Khorosho, Ivan, Khorosho," she repeated, and
leaping to her feet, she clapped her hands, snatched
up the pitcher, and ran off.

And from thenceforth she, every day, brought him
some milk privately. Now the Tatars used to make
cheese-cakes out of goats' milk and dried them on
their roofs, and these cheese-cakes she also supplied
him with secretly. And once, when the master of
the house slaughtered a sheep, she brought him a bit
of mutton in her sleeve, flung it down before him and
ran off

Occasionally there were heavy storms, and the
rain poured down for a whole hour as if out of a
bucket, and all the streams grew turbid and over-
flowed. Where there had been a ford there was then
three arshtns\ of water, and the stones were whirled
from their places. Streams then flowed everywhere,
and there was a distant roar in the mountains. And
so when the storm had passed over, the whole village
was full of watercourses. After one of these storms
Zhilin asked his master to lend him a knife, carved
out a little cylinder and a little board, attached a
wheel to them, and fastened a puppet at each end of
the wheeL

* Good. f An arshin is a Russian ell.
112

The Captive in the Caucasus

The girls thereupon brought him rags, and he
dressed up one of his puppets as a man and the other
as a woman, fastened them well in, and placed the
wheel in the stream, whereupon the wheel turned and
the puppets leaped up and down.

The whole village assembled to look at them.
The little boys came, and the little girls and the
women, and at last the Tatars themselves, and they
clicked their tongues and said: "Aye! Urus! aye,
Ivan!"

Now Abdul had some broken Russian watches.
He called Zhilin, pointed at these watches, and
clicked with his tongue. Zhilin said :

" Give them to me, and I'll repair them ! "

He took them to pieces with the help of his knife,
examined them, put them together again, and
returned them to their owner. The watches were
now going.

Zhilin's master was greatly delighted at this, and
brought him his old besktnet, which was all in rags,
and gave it to him to mend. What could Zhilin do
but take and mend it — and the same night its owner
was able to cover himself with it.

From henceforth Zhilin had the reputation of a
master-craftsman. The people used now to come to
him from distant villages ; one sent his matchlodk or
his pistol to Zhilin to be mended, another sent his
watch or clock. His master even gave him various
utensils to mend, such as snuffers, gimlets, and other
things.

Once one of the Tatars fell ill, and they sent for
Zhilin to see him.

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" Come and cure him! " said they.

Now Zhilin knew nothing at all about curing.
Nevertheless, he went, looked at the man, and
thought : " Who knows* perhaps he may get well by
himself!" So he went back to the outhouse, got
water and sand, and mixed them both together.
Then he whispered something over the water in the
Tatar's presence and gave him the mixture to drink.
Fortunately for him the Tatar recovered. Then
Zhilin began to stand very high indeed in their
opinion. And these Tatars, who had got used to him,
used to cry, "Ivan! Ivan!" whenever they wanted
him, and all of them treated him as if he were some
pet domestic animal.

But the red-bearded Tatar did not like Zhilin.
Whenever he saw him he would frown and turn away,
even if he didn't scold him outright. Now these
Tatars hail an old chief who did not live in the aul
but up in the mountains. The only time when he
saw Zhilin was when he came to pray to God in the
mosque. He was small in stature, and a white hand-
kerchief was always wound around his turban, his
beard and moustaches were clipped short and as
white as down, his face was red like a brick and
wrinkled. He had the curved nose of a vulture, grey
evil eyes, and no teeth, except a couple of fangs-
He used to come in his turban, leaning on his
crutch, and glaring about him like an old wolf.
Whenever he saw Zhilin he began to snarl and
turned away.

Once Zhilin went up the mountain to see how the
old chief lived. As he went along a little path he

114

The Captive in the Caucasus

saw a little garden surrounded by a stone fence with
wild cherry and peach trees looking over it, and inside
a little hut with a flat roof. Zhilin approached nearer,
and then he saw beehives made of plaited straw —
ului they called them — and the bees flying about
and humming. And the little old man was on his
tiny knees doing something to the hives. Zhilin
raised himself a little higher to have a better look,
and his kolodka grated The little old man looked
round and whined aloud, then he drew a pistol out
of his girdle and fired point-blank at Zhilin. After
firing he hid behind a stone.

Next morning the old man came down to Zhilin's
master to complain of him. Zhilin's master called him
and said to him with a laugh :

" Why didst thou go to the old man ? "

" I did him no harm," said Zhilin. " I only wanted
to see how he lived."

Zhilin's master interpreted.

The old man was very angry however. He hissed
and gabbled, and his two fangs protruded, and he
shook his fist at Zhilin.

Zhilin did not understand it at all. All he under-
stood was that the old man bade his master kill all
the Russians and not keep any of them in the auL
Finally, the old man went away.

Zhilin now began to ask his master who the little
old man was, and this is what his master told him.

"That is a great man. He was our foremost
zhigit* and has killed many Russians ; he is also rich.
Once he had eight sons, and they all dwelt together

* Hero.
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in one village. The Russians came, destroyed the
village, and slew seven of his sons. One son only
remained, and he surrendered to the Russians. Then
the old man went away, and surrendered himself also to
the Russians. He lived with them for three months,
found out where his son was, slew him, and ran away.
From thenceforth he renounced warfare and went
to Mecca — to pray to God. Hence he has his turban.
Whoever has been to Mecca is called Hadji, and
may put on a turban. He does not love thy brother.*
He bade me slay thee, but I will not slay thee, because
I want to make money out of thee ; and, besides, I
have begun to love thee, Ivan, and so far from killing
thee, I would not let thee go away at all if I hadn't
given my word upon it" He laughed, and then he
added in Russian : " The welfare of thee, Ivan, is the
welfare of me, Abdul ! "

IV.

So Zhilin lived like this for a month. In the day-
time he went about the aul, or made all sorts of
things with his hands, and when night came, and all
was silent in the aul, he began digging inside his out-
house. Digging was difficult because of the rock, but
he fretted away the rock with a file, and dug a hole
under the wall, through which, at the proper time,
he meant to crawL

" If only I knew the place fairly well/' he said to
himself, "if only I knew in which direction to go.
But the Tatars never give themselves away."

* The speaker himself.

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The Captive in the Caucasus

One day he chose a time when his master had
gone away, and after dinner he went up the mountain
behind the aul — he wanted to survey the whole place
from thence. But when his master went away he
had commanded a lad to follow Zhilin wherever he
went and not lose sight of him. So- the youngster
ran after Zhilin, and cried: "Don't go! Father
didn't tell you to. I'll call the people this instant."

Zhilin set about persuading him.

" I'm not going far," said he, " I only want to climb
that mountain there. I want to find herbs to cure
your people. Come with me! I can't run away
with this kolodka on my leg. And to-morrow I'll
make you a bow and arrows."

So he persuaded the lad and they went together.
The mountain did not seem far, but it was difficult
going with the kolodka; he went on and on and it
taxed his utmost strength. Whei^ he got to the
summit Zhilin sat down to take a good look at the
place. To the south, behind the outhota^ wrfr a
gully, a tabun* was roaming along there, aifl^another
aul was visible as a tiny point. Beyond this aul
was another and still steeper mountain, and behind
this mountain yet another. Between the mountains
was the blue outline of a wood, and there could be
seen other mountains, rising higher and higher.
And higher than all, as white as sugar, stood
yet other mountains covered with snow. And one
snowy mountain with a cap on stood out higher than
all the rest. On the east and on the west were
similar mountains ; here and there smoking auls could

* A herd of horses.
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be seen in the ravines. u Well," thought Zhilin, " all
that is their part of the country." Then he began
looking towards the Russian side — at his feet were
the stream, his own aul, and little gardens all around
By the stream, like so many little puppets, the women
were sitting and rinsing clothes. Behind the aul,
somewhat lower down, was a mountain with two
other mountains in between, and after that came
woods; and between the two mountains, looking
blue in the distance, was a level space, and far, far
away in this level space some smoke was rising.
Zhilin tried to remember where the sun used to rise
and where it used to set when he lived at home in
the fortress. And then he saw that " our "* fortress
must needs be on that very plain. Thither, then,
between the two mountains, his flight must lie.

The sun was beginning to set The snow-covered
mountains turned from white to rosy red ; the black
mountains grew darker; the mist began to ascend
from the gullies, and that very valley in which the
Russian fortress needs must be glowed like a fire in
the distant West Zhilin looked steadily in that
direction — something was dimly visible in the valley
like smoke from a tube. And he thought to himself
that must be the Russian fortress itself.

It was getting late. The cry of the mullah could
be heard from where they were. The flocks were
being driven homewards, the cows were lowing. The
little lad kept on saying : " Let's be going ! " but
Zhilin did not want to go.

At last, however, they turned homewards. " Well/'

* /.*. — the Russian fortress.

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The Captive in the Caucasus

thought Zhilin, " at any rate I know the place now,
and must make a bolt for it." He would have liked
to have escaped that very night The nights just
then were dark — -the moon was on the wane. Un-
fortunately, the Tatars returned that very evening.
They used to come in driving captured cattle before
them in a merry mood ; but on this occasion they
drove in nothing at all, and brought along with them
on his saddle a slain Tatar, the brother of the red-
bearded Tatar. They arrived very wrathful, and
gathered together to bury their comrade. Zhilin also
came out to see what was going on. They wrapped
the corpse in a piece of cloth without a coffin, then
they placed it on the grass in the middle of the
village under a plane-tree. The mullah arrived, and
they all squatted down together on their heels in
front of the corpse.

The mullah was in front, behind him sat the three
village elders in their turbans, and in a row with and
behind them some more Tatars. There they sat with
dejected eyes and in silence. The silence lasted for a
long time, and then the mullah raised his head and
spoke :

" Allah ! " he said. It was the only word he spoke
— and once more they all cast down their eyes and
were silent for a long time. They sat there without
stirring. Again the mullah raised his voice :

"Allah!"

" Allah ! " they all repeated, and were again silent
The dead man was lying on the grass, he moved not,
and they all sat round him like dead men. Not one
of them stirred The only thing to be heard was

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the quivering of the tiny leaves of the plane-tree
in the light breeze. Then the mullah recited the
prayer, and they all stood up, raised the dead man,
and carried him away. They carried him to the
grave. The grave was not simply dug out but
burrowed underneath the ground like a cellar. They
lifted the dead man beneath the shoulders and under
the legs, bent him a little inwards, and slowly let him
go, thrusting him in under the earth in a sitting
position, and pulling his arms straight down close to
his body.

The Nogaets then brought green rushes and filled
up the hole therewith, strewed it with fresh earth,
made it level, and placed at the head of the dead man
an upright stone. Then they stamped down the
earth, again sat them round about the grave, and were
for a long time silent

"Allah! Allah! Allah!" And they sighed
deeply and stood up.

The red-bearded man distributed money among
the elders, then he arose, took up his short whip,
struck his forehead three times, and went home.

In the morning Zhilin saw them leading a fine mare
out of the village with three Tatars following behind.
When they got right out of the village, the red-
bearded Tatar took off his beshmet, tucked up his
sleeves — what big brawny arms he had ! — drew forth
his knife, and sharpened it on a bruska* The Tatars
then drew forward the mare's head, and the red-
bearded man came forward and cut her throat, flung the
mare to the ground, and began to flay her, separating

* A tetragonal piece of sandstone.
1 20

The Captive in the Caucasus

the hide from the flesh with his huge hands. Then the
women and the girls came up and began to wash the
entrails and the inside. After that they cut up the
mare and dragged the meat into the hut And the
whole village came together at the house of the red-
bearded man to commemorate the deceased.

Three days they ate of the mare, drank buza> and
commemorated the deceased.

All the Tatars were at home now, but on the fourth
day Zhilin, after dinner, beheld them assembling to
go somewhither. They brought their horses, made
ready, and went off, ten men in all, and the red-
bearded man went too? — only Abdul remained at
home. There was a new moon just then, and the
nights were still pretty dark.

" Now's the time," thought Zhilin ; " now we must
make a bolt for it" He spoke to Kostuilin about
it, but Kostuilin was afraid.

" How can we run away ? — we don't know the
road ! " said he.

"I know the road."

" But we shall never be able to get there in the night."

" Suppose we don't, surely we can pass the night in
the forest? And look! Fve collected some hearth-
cakes. Why do you want to stick here ? 'Tis easy
enough to send for money, but you see they haven't
collected it. And besides, the Tatars are angry now
because the Russians have killed one of their people.
They have been talking together about killing us
likewise."

Kostuilin thought and thought for a long time.

" Very well, let us go ! " said he at last

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Zhilin crept into his hole and dug still deeper in
order that Kostuilin also might be able to creep
through it, then they sat down and waited till all was
quiet in the aul.

As soon as all the people in the aul were quiet,
Zhilin crept under the wall and forced his way
through. Then he whispered to Kostuilin:

" You creep through too ! " and as he did so he
loosed a stone, which made a great noise. Zhilin's
master, however, had placed a guard at the door —
a piebald dog, a vicious, a very vicious beast His
name was Ulyashin. But Zhilin had made it his
business regularly to feed the animal for some time.
As soon as Ulyashin heard them he began to bark
and rushed up, and after him all the other dogs. But
Zhilin just whistled to him, and threw him a bit of
hearth-cake. Then Ulyashin recognised him, wagged
his tail, and ceased to bark.

But Zhilin's master had heard, and he now began
to shout from out of the saklya :

"Hold him! hold him, Ulyashin!"

Zhilin, however, was busy scratching Ulyashin
behind the ears, and the dog was silent, rubbed him-
self against Zhilin's legs, and wagged his tail

They sat down behind a corner. All grew quiet
again. All that could be heard were the sheep
shuffling in their fold, and the water below bubbling
over the stones. It was dark. The stars stood high
in the heavens, the young red moon stood over the

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The Captive in the Caucasus

mountain with her horns pointed upwards. In the
valley gleamed a milk-white mist

Zhilin arose, and said to his comrade :

"Now, my brother, let's be off! "

Something stirred just as they were starting. They
stopped to listen. The mullah was chanting on the
roof:

"Allah! Bismillah! IPrakhman!" which signifies :
" Come, people, to the Mosque ! "

They sat down again, squeezing themselves against
the wall Long they sat there, waiting till the people
should have gone by. Again all was silent.

" Now, then, in God's name ! "

They crossed themselves and set out. They went
through the courtyard, down the steep slope to the
stream, crossed the stream, and went along the gully.
The mist was thick and stood low, and over their
heads the stars were dimly, tinily visible. Zhilin
calculated by the stars which way he ought to take.
It was fresh in the mist and easy going, but their boots
were in their way and made them stumble. Zhilin
took his off, threw them away, and went along bare-
footed. He kept leaping from rock to rock and
looking at the stars. Kostuilin began to lag behind.

" Go more quietly ! " said he ; " these cursed boots
of mine ! — but all boots fetter one so ! "

" Take them off, then ! You'll find it easier
going."

Kostuilin also then went barefooted — and found it
still worse. He was bruising his feet continually on
the stones, and kept lagging behind more than ever.

" Lift up your feet more, look alive ! " said Zhilin,

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" if they overtake us they'll kill us, and that will be
worst of alL"

Kostuilin said nothing. He came on puffing and
blowing. For a long time they went down hilL They
listened — the dogs were barking on their right
Zhilin stopped and looked about him. He went to
the mountain-side and felt it with his hands.

" Oh ! " said he, " we have made a mistake ; we
turned to the right Here is another aul, I could see
it from the mountain-top, we must go back — to the
left — up the mountain. There is sure to be a road
there."

" Just wait a little," said Kostuilin ; " do give me
time to breathe a bit — my feet axe all bloody."

" Look alive, my brother ! Spring a little more
lightly— that's the whole trick ! "

And Zhilin ran back to the left towards the
mountain and into the wood. Kostuilin remained all
behind, groaning and gasping.

Zhilin kept urging him to be quicker, but went on
himself without stopping.

They ascended the mountain. Yes — there, right
enough, was the wood They entered the wood —
and all that was left of their clothing was quickly
torn to bits. Then they hit upon a path in the wood,
and went steadily on.

Stop! The sound of hoofs resounded on the
road. They stopped and listened. There was a
stamping as of a horse, and then it stopped. They
moved on again — the stamping recommenced. They
stopped — and the stamping stopped. Zhilin crept
forward and looked along the road in the light —

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The Captive in the Caucasus

something was standing there. It was a horse, and
yet not a horse, and on the horse was something odd,
not resembling a man. It snorted — they listened.
" What monster could it be ? " Zhilin whistled very
softly — it scurried off the path into the forest, and
in the forest there was a crashing sound — it flew like
a tempest, breaking down the branches in its path.

Kostuilin almost fell to the ground in his terror.
But Zhilin laughed and said :

"That was a stag. Hark how he smashes the
wood with his horns. We fear him and he fears us."

They went along further. Morning was now close
at hand. Where they were going, however, they
knew not. It seemed to Zhilin as if the Tatars had
brought him along by that selfsame path, and as far
as he could make it out they had still some ten versts
to traverse ; but there were no certain landmarks, and
it was night, so that there was no distinguishing any-
thing. Presently they came out upon a little plain,
and Kostuilin sat down and said :

"You may do as you like, but I shall never get
there. My legs won't do it"

Zhilin tried to persuade him.

" No," said he, " I shan't go any further — I can't, I
tell you."

Zhilin then grew angry. He spat on one side and
bullied his comrade.

"Then I'll go on alone," said he— "good-bye! "

Then Kostuilin leaped to his feet and went on.
They now went on for four miles. The mist in the
forest grew still thicker ; they could see nothing in
front of them, and the stars were barely visible.

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At last they heard something like the trampling
of a horse in front of them. They could hear the
hoofs clattering against the stones, Zhilin lay down
on his stomach and began to listen with his ear to
the ground.

" Yes," said he, " it is as I thought A horseman
is coming towards us."

They quitted the road in haste, sat among the
bushes, and waited. Zhilin presently crept forward
towards the road and saw a mounted Tatar coming
along, driving a cow before him, and muttering to
himself. After he had gone Zhilin turned to Kostuilin
and said:

" He's gone by, thank God! Get up, and we'll go
on!"

Kostuilin tried to get up and fell down again. He
was a heavy, puffy fellow, and began to sweat
profusely. The cold mist of the forest, too, had
given him a chill, his feet were lacerated, and he went
all to pieces. When Zhilin raised him to his feet
with an effort he cried out :

"Oh! it hurts!"

Zhilin almost had! a fit

"What are you screeching for! The Tatars are
quite close to us — don't you hear ? " But he thought
to himself: "He really is almost done for; what am
I to do with him? One can't chuck a comrade, it
wouldn't be right"

" Well," said he, " get up on my back. I'll carry
you if you really can't walk yourself."

So he put Kostuilin on his shoulders, gripped him
under the knees, took the road again, and staggered
along.

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The Captive in the Caucasus

" Only, my good fellow," said he, " don't grip me
round the throat, but lay hold of my shoulders."

It was a heavy load for Zhilia His feet also were
all bloody, and he was tired to death. He felt
crushed, tried to get into an easier position, hitched
his shoulder so as to get Kostuilin to sit higher — and
flung him into the road.

It was quite plain that the Tatar had heard Kostuilin
yell, for as Zhilin listened he could hear someone
coming back and making a peculiar cry. Zhilin flung
himself into the bushes. The Tatar seized his musket,
fired it, hit nothing, whined in Tatar fashion, and
galloped down the road again.

"Well, my brother, he has gone anyway," said
Zhilin ; " but the dog will at once collect all the Tatars
he can find and pursue us. If we don't do our three
miles, we're done for." But he thought to himself :
" What devil put it into my head to take this block-
head with me ! Had I been alone I should have
got off long ago."

"You go on alone," said Kostuilin, "why should
you come to grief all through me ? "

" Nay, I will not go alone, it is wrong to desert a
comrade."

So he took him on his shoulders again and went
on. And in this way he covered a mile. The forest
stretched right on, and there was no sign of an exit
The mist was beginning to disperse, and little clouds
— or so they seemed — fared along, the stars were
no longer visible. Zhilin was puzzled.

A spring, set among rocks, crossed the road, and
here Zhilin stopped and set down Kostuilin.

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"Let's have a rest," said he, "and give me
breathing-time. I want a drink, too, and we'll have
some hearth-cakes. It can't be much further now."

No sooner had he drunk his fill, however, than he
heard the trampling of hoofs behind. Once more
they crept among the bushes on the right, beneath
the steep cliff, and lay at full length.

Soon they heard the voices of the Tatars, and the
Tatars stopped at the very spot whence they had
turned off from the road. They talked a good deal
amongst themselves«, and then they began to put upon
the scent the dogs they had brought with them. Zhilin
and his comrade listened There was a crashing of
branches in the thicket, and straight towards them
came a strange dog. When he saw them he stood
still and began barking.

Then the Tatars also crept through the bushes —
they were strange Tatars whom they hadn't seen
before — and the Tatars seized them, bound them,
put them on horseback, and led them off.

They went along for about three miles, and then
they met Zhilin's master, Abdul, and two other Tatars.
These said something to the strange Tatars, trans-
ferred the captives to their own horses, and brought
them back to the auL

Abdul laughed no longer, and said not a single
word to them.

They brought them into the aul at break of day,
and set them down in the public street The children
came running up and beat them with stones and whips
and jeered at them.

The Tatars gathered together in a circle, and the

128

The Captive in the Caucasus

elder from the mountain-side joined them They
began talking, and Zhilin understood that they were
trying them and debating what was to be done with
them. Some said they should be sent further away
into the mountains, but the elder said that they ought
to be killed Abdul, however, objected to this. " I
have paid money for them," said he, " and I am going
to get a ransom for them."

" They'll never pay anything at all," replied the
old man, " but will only do harm. It's a sin to feed
Russians. Kill them and have done with it ! "

Then they separated, and Zhilin's master came to
him and began to talk to him.

" If they don't send me your ransom in a fortnight,"
said he, " I'll whip you to death, and if you try to
run away a second time I'll kill you like dogs. Write
a letter, and mind you write a good one ! "

Paper was brought and they wrote the letter. Then
the kolodki were fastened to them again, and they
were taken to the mosque. Here there was a hole
in the earth five arshins long, and into this hole they
were cast

VI.

Their life was now hard indeed. Their kolodki
were never taken off, and they were never allowed
a breath of fresh air. The Tatars flung them bits of
uncooked dough as if they were dogs, and filled for
them a pitcher of water from time to time.

The heat of the hole was stifling, and it was damp
and stinking. Kostuilin became downright ill. His

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limbs swelled and twitched all over, and he groaned
continually except when he was asleep. Zhilin also
was dejected ; he saw they were in evil case, and how
to get out of it he had no idea.

He would have begun undermining again, but there
was nowhere to hide the earth, and then, too, his
master had threatened to kill him.

One day he was squatting in the hole thinking of
life and liberty, and he felt very miserable. Suddenly
right upon his knees fell a hearth-cake, and then
another, followed by quite a shower of wild cherries.
He looked up and there was Dina. She gazed at
him, laughed a little, and ran away. " Now I wonder
if Dina would help us," thought Zhilin.

He cleaned a little corner of the hole, dug out
a bit of clay, and made cut of it a lot of puppets.
He made men and women* horses and dogs, and
thought to himself, "When Dina comes I'll fling
them out to her."

But on the next day there was no Dina, and Zhilin
heard the trampling of horses and the noise of people
passing to and fro, and he could hear that the Tatars
had assembled at the mosque and were disputing
and screeching and consulting about the Russians.
And he also heard the voice of the old man of the
mountain. He could not make out very well what
was going on, but he guessed that the Russians were
drawing near, and the Tatars were afraid they might
come to the aid and find out what was being done
with the captives.

The Tatars debated together and then departed.
Suddenly Zhilin heard a slight noise above his head.

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The Captive in the Caucasus

He looked up, and there was Dina squatting on her
haunches with her knees hunched up higher than her
head ; she was leaning forward, her necklaces were
visible, and were swinging to and fro right over the
hole. Her little eyes gleamed like tiny stars, and
she drew out of her sleeve two cheese-cakes and
threw them to him.

Zhilin took them and said: "Why have you
been so long gone ? I have been making playthings for
you. Look ! " And he began to fling them to her
one by one.

But she shook her head and would not look at
them. " I don't want 'em," she said. She sat silent
for a while, and then she said, " Ivan, they want to
kill thee," and she drew her hand across her throat

" Who wants to kill me?"

"Father, the elders have bidden him do it. But
I'm sorry for thee."

" If you are sorry for me," said Zhilin, " bring me
a long pole."

She shook her head to signify that it was im-
possible. He put together his hands and besought
her.

" Dina, I pray thee do it ! Dear little Dina, bring
it to me!"

" Impossible," said she, " they are all at home, you
see ! " and off she ran.

So Zhilin sat there all the evening and thought :
° What will come of it, I wonder? " He kept looking
up all the time. The stars were visible, but the
moon had not yet risen. The mullah's shrill cry was
heard — and then all was silent. Zhilin began to

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grow drowsy. "Plainly, the girl is afraid," he
thought

Suddenly a piece of clay plumped down on his
head. He looked up — a long pole was thrust into a
corner of the hole. It waggled about, descended
gradually, and began to work its way into the hole.
Zhilin was delighted He caught hold of it and drew
it in — it was a good strong pole. He had noticed
this pole some time before on the roof of his master's
home.

He looked up again. The stars were shining high
in the heavens, and right above the hole the eyes of
Dina shone as brightly as the eyes of a cat in the
darkness. She leaned forward over the mouth of
the hole and whispered :

" Ivan ! Ivan ! " and she kept on making signs and
drawing her hands repeatedly over her face by way of
saying : " Hush ! be quiet ! "

" What is it? " asked Zhilin.

" They have all gone, there are only two at home."

" Well, Kostuilin, let us go," said Zhilin, " we will
try for the last time. Til help you to get out of it."

But Kostuilin wouldn't even hear of it

" No," said he, " it's quite plain that I can't manage
it I have not the strength to go quickly, whichever
way we go."

" Farewell then ! and think no ill of me for leaving
you ! " And he embraced Kostuilin.

Then he seized the pole, bade Dina hold it firm,
and began to creep up it Once or twice he fell
down — the kolodka hampered him. Kostuilin then
supported him, and he worked his way some distance

132

The Captive in the Caucasus

up. Dina dragged away at his shirt with her little
hands with all her might, laughing all the time, but
it was no good.

Then Zhilin laid hold of the pole with both hands.

"Pull it, Dina!" he cried, "seize hold of it well,
and you'll see it will almost come to you of its own
accord."

She pulled away at the pole accordingly, and
presently Zhilin found himself up at the mountain's-
side. He crept down the steep declivity, seized a
sharp stone, and tried hard to force the lock of the
kolodka. But the lock was a strong one, by no means
could he break it, and yet he was not unskilful
Then he heard somone running down the mountain-
side and leaping lightly along. " That must be Dina
again," thought Zhilin. And Dina it was. Up she
came running, took up a large stone, and said :

"Give it me!"

She squatted down on her little knees, and began
to try her hand at it But her little arms, as thin as
twigs, had no strength in them, and she threw away
the stone and burst into tears. Then Zhilin himself
had another try at the lock while Dina sat down
beside him, leaning against his shoulder. Zhilin
glanced round and saw on the left side of the
mountain a burning red reflection — the moon was
rising. " Well," thought he, " before the moon rises
I must make my way through the gully and get to
the wood." He rose and threw away the stone.
Kolodka or no — go he must

" Good-bye, little Dina," said he ; "I shall always
remember thee."

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Dina seized him, and began to fumble about his
sleeves to see if she could find a place wherein to stuff
some pancakes. He took the pancakes.

"Thanks, my wise little woman," said he; "who
will make dolls for thee when I am gone, I wonder?"
And he stroked her head

How bitterly Dina wept ! Finally she covered her
face with her hands and ran away up the mountain
like a wild kid. The clattering of the coins in the
long tresses of hair hanging down her back was
audible in the darkness.

Zhilin crossed himself, seized the lock of the
kolodka so as not to stumble as he went, and
hobbled along the road, gazing constantly at the
reflection of light where the moon was rising. He
knew the road. He had to go straight on for about
eight miles. If only he could get to the forest before
the moon had quite risen ! He crossed the stream —
the light behind the mountain was growing brighter.
He passed through the gully. On he went, glancing
upwards from time to time — still the moon was not
visible. The burning reflection was increasing, and
everything on one side of the gully was growing
brighter and brighter. A shadow was creeping along
the mountain and coming nearer and nearer to him.

Zhilin went on and on, and the shadows still con-
tinued to advance. He hastened on, and the moon
was working her way out even more quickly than
he had anticipated, to the right the tops of the trees
were already lit up. He was now close to the forest
when the moon burst forth from behind the mountain
— everything was as light and bright as if it were

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The Captive in the Caucasus

day. Every little leaf on every little tree was visible.
It was quite quiet on the lit-up mountain-sides as if
everything had died out of existence. The only
thing to be heard was the gurgling of the stream
below.

He reached the forest without anything happening.
Zhilin chose the darkest spot he could find in the
forest, and there he sat down to rest

After recovering his breath, he ate a hearth-cake.
Then he took a stone, and again set about battering
the kolodka. He battered it with all the strength
of his arm, and he could not break it He arose and
went along the road. He went for a mile, got
thoroughly exhausted — his legs tottered beneath him.
Ten steps more he took, and then he stopped short

" It's no use," said he ; " all I can do is to drag
myself on as long as I have the strength to do so. If
once I sit down I shall not get up again. I can never
get to the fortress to-day, but as soon as it is dawn
I will lie up in the forest and at night I'll go on
again."

All night he went along. The only people he
encountered were two mounted Tatars, and as he
saw them at a distance, he was able to hide away
from them behind a tree.

The moon had already begun to wane, the dew was
falling, it was close upon dawn, and still Zhilin
had not got to the end of the forest. " Well," thought
he, " just thirty steps more, and then Til turn into
the forest and sit down." He took the thirty steps,
and saw that the forest was cojmig to an end. He
went out to the very end of H^HThere, quite bright

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before him, as if on the palm of his hands, lay the
steppe and the fortress, and to the left, quite close
under the mountain-side, camp-fires were burning
and smoking, and people were standing round the
smouldering logs.

He gazed fixedly, and saw cossacks — soldiers —
and glistening arms.

Zhilin, full of joy, rallied his last remaining
strength, and prepared to descend the mountain-side.

" God grant," thought he, " that a mounted Tatar
may not see me in the open plain, although I'm pretty
near now, I'm not there yet"

And the thought was no sooner in his head, when
behold! on a little mound stood three Tatars, about
two furlongs off. They saw him — and dashed after
him. His heart absolutely died away within him.
Then he waved his arms and shouted with all the
breath he had in his body :

"My brothers! my brothers! save me!"

Our fellows heard him, and some mounted Cossacks
galloped forward. They made for him in an oblique
direction to cut off the Tatars.

The Cossacks were far off, the Tatars were near,
but now Zhilin rallied all his strength, seized his
kolodka> and ran towards the Cossacks, no longer
remembering who he was, but crossing himself and
crying continually :

"Brothers! brothers! brothers!"

The Cossacks were about fifteen in number.

The Tatars grew frightened — instead of drawing
nearer they reined in their horses. And Zhilin ran
right into the Cossacks.

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The Captive in the Caucasus

The Cossacks surrounded him, and asked him who
he was and whence he came. But Zhilin no longer
recollected who he was, and burst out crying, babbling
all the time :

"Brothers! brothers !"

The regular soldiers next came running out, and
crowded round Zhilin. One of them offered him
bread, another broth, a third covered him with a
mantle, a fourth broke up the kolodka.

The officers presently recognised him, and con-
ducted him to the fortress. The soldiers were
delighted, and his comrades gathered round Zhilin.

Zhilin told them all that had happened to him, and
said:

" You see, I was going home to be married. But
no! — that is not to be my fate evidently! "

And so he continued to serve in the Caucasus.

As for Kostuilin, they only ransomed him three
months later for five thousand roubles. They
brought him in barely alive.

137

III.— HATRED IS SWEET, BUT GOD IS STRONG

IN the olden time there lived a good master. He had
much of everything, and many slaves served him.
And the slaves praised their master. They said:
"There is no master better than our master under
heaven. He clothes and feeds us well, and gives us
work to do according to our strength ; he offends none
by word of mouth, and bears no grudge for anything.
He is not like other masters who torment their slaves
and treat them worse than cattle, and punish them
whethesr they commit faults or not, and have not a good
word to say to them. Our master has our welfare at
heart, and does good to us, and speaks well to us.
We want no better life than the life we lead"

Thus did the slaves praise their master. And the
Devil was wroth because the slaves lived so well, and
in all loving-kindness with their master. And the
Devil took possession of one of the slaves of this
master, whose name was Aleb. He took possession
of him, and bade him offend the other slaves And
when the other slaves were resting from their labours
and praising their master, Aleb also lifted up his
voice and said :

" Vainly do ye praise the goodness of our master,
my brethren. Try and please the Devil, and the

138

Hatred is Sweet, but God is Strong

Devil will do you good. We serve our master well,
we please him in everything. Whatever he fancies
that we do for him, we anticipate his thoughts* How
can he help being good to us? But just cease to
please, and do him evil, then you'll find he'll be like
all the rest of them, and will render evil for evil even
worse than the bad masters do."

And the other slaves began to dispute with Aleb.
And they disputed and laid a wager together. And
Aleb undertook to provoke the good master to anger.
He undertook io do so on this condition : that if he
did not provoke him to anger he should lose his
festival garment, but if he did provoke him to anger
they promised that each one of them should give him
his festival garment ; and besides that they promised
to defend him against his master, and if he put him
in irons or thrust him into a dungeon they said they
would loose him. So they laid their wager, and the
next morning Aleb promised to provoke his master
to anger.

Aleb served his master in the sheep-folds and took
charge of the costly breeding rams. And behold ! in
the morning, when the good master came to the
sheep-folds with his guests and began to show them
his dear and precious rams, the Devil's labourer signi-
fied to his comrades : " Look now, I'll provoke my
master to anger instantly." All the slaves assembled.
They looked through doors and over fences, and the
Devil ran up a tree, and looked down from thence
into the yard to see how his servant would serve
him. The master entered the yard and showed his
guests his sheep and his lambs, and wanted to show

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More Tales from Tolstoi

them his best ram. "The other rams are good,"

said he, " but this is one with strong horns ; he is

priceless, and more precious to me than my own

eyes." The sheep and rams rushed about the yard

because of the people, and the guests could not

distinguish the precious ram amongst them. No

sooner did this ram stand still than the Devil's

labourer, as if by accident, scared the sheep, and again

they were all intermingled. The guests could not

distinguish the ram that was priceless. And the

master began to be wearied " Aleb, my dear friend,"

said he, " see thou to this ! Catch the best ram with

the strong horns very warily and hold him fast."

And no sooner had the master said this than Aleb

flung himself like a lion in the middle of the lambs

and sheep, and seized the priceless ram by his shorn

fleece. He seized it by the shorn fleece, and

immediately clasped it round its left hind leg with

one of his hands, lifted it up, and right before

the very eyes of his master, tugged the leg violently

upwards, and it snapped like the peeled branch

of a young linden-tree. Aleb had broken the leg

of the good ram below the knee. The ram began

to bleat, and fell down on its front knees. Aleb

seized it by the right leg, and the left leg turned

inwards and hung down like a short whip. The

guests and all the slaves groaned, and the Devil

rejoiced when he saw how cleverly Aleb had done

his deed. The master turned as black as .night, he

frowned, cast down his head, and said not a word

The guests and the slaves were silent They wanted

to see what would happen. The master was silent

140

Hatred is Sweet, but God is Strong

for a time, then he shook himself as if he wanted to
shake off something, raised his head, and fixed his
eyes on heaven. Not long did he look, his wrinkles
disappeared from his face, and he smiled and cast
his eyes upon Aleb. He looked at Aleb, smiled,
and Said:

" Oh, Aleb, Aleb ! thy master bade thee anger
me. But my master is stronger than thine, and thou
hast not angered me, but I have angered thy master.
Thou didst fear that I would punish thee, and thou
didst wish to be free, Aleb ; know, therefore, that I
will not punish thee, but as thou didst desire thy
freedom, look now! in the presence of my guests I
release thee, thou art free to follow thine own will.
Depart whithersoever thou wilt, to the four corners
of the earth, and take thy festival garment with
thee!"

And the good master went home with his guests.
But the Devil gnashed his teeth, glided down the
tree, and vanished through the earth.

141

IV.— ELI AS

There dwelt once upon a time in the Ufimsk
government a Bashkir named Elias. The father
of Elias had left him a poor man. His father had
only gotten him a wife a year before, and then died.
In those days Elias owned seven mares, two cows,
and twice ten sheep. But Elias was now the master,
and began to spread himself out ; from morn to eve
he laboured with his wife, rose up earlier and lay
down later than all other men, and grew richer every
year. Five-and-thirty years did Elias continue to
labour, and won for himself great possessions.

Elias now had two hundred head of horses, a
hundred and fifty head of horned cattle, and one
thousand two hundred sheep. Many men-servants
pastured the tabuns* and the herds of Elias, and
many maid-servants milked the mares and the cows
and made kumis, butter and cheese. Elias had much
of everything, and everybody round about envied the
life of Elias. People said : " Ah, what a lucky fellow
that Elias is ! He has everything in abundance, he
has no need to die." And good people began to
know Elias and make his acquaintance. And guests
came to him from afar. And Elias welcomed them
* Studs of horses.
142

Elias

all, and gave them to eat and to drink. Whosoever
came to him found abundance of kumis, and tea, and
sherbet, and the flesh of rams. Whenever guests
came a ram or two was immediately killed, and if
there were many guests they killed a mare.

Elias had three children — two sons and a daughter.
Elias had provided his sons with wives, and had
given his daughter in marriage. While Elias was
poor his sons had worked with him and guarded the
herds and the tabuns themselves, but when the sons
became rich they began to amuse themselves, and
one of them took to drink. One of them — the eldest
— was presently killed in a brawl, and the younger
son fell into the power of a stuck-up wife, and this
son no longer listened to his father, and Elias had to
give him his portion and get rid of him.

So Elias paid him out and gave him a house and
cattle, and the riches of Elias were diminished. And
shortly after this a disease fell upon the sheep of
Elias, and many of them perished. And then came
a year of scarceness — no hay would grow — and many
cattle starved in the winter. Then the Kirghiz came
and stole the best part of the horses, and the estate
of Elias diminished. still further. Elias began to fall
lower and lower, and his natural forces were less.
And when he had reached his seventieth year things
came to such a pass that he began to sell his furs,
his carpets, his kibitki* and then he began to sell
his cattle, down to the very last one; and so Elias
came to nought. And he himself perceived that he
had nothing left, and he was obliged in his old age
* A covered wagon.
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More Tales from Tolstoi

to go with his wife to live among the common people.
And the only things which Elias could now call his
own were the clothes he had on his body, his fur
cloak, his hat, and his shoes ; and his wife, Shem
Shemagi, was also an old woman. The son whom
he had bought off departed into a distant land, and
his daughter died. And there was none to help the
old folks.

Their neighbour, Muhamedshah, pitied the old
folks. He himself was neither rich nor poor, but
lived at his ease, and he was a good man. He
remembered that he had eaten bread and salt with
Elias, and he was filled with compassion and said
to Elias :

"Come to me, Elias, and live with me along
with thine old woman. In the summer thou shalt
work for me according to thy strength in the
melon fields, knd in the winter thou shalt feed my
cattle and let Shem Shemagi milk the cows and
make kumis. I will feed and clothe you both, and
whatever ye may want tell it me and I will give it
you."

Elias thanked his neighbour and dwelt with his
wife in the house of Muhamedshah as one of his
servants. At first it seemed grievous to them, but
soon they grew accustomed to it, and the old people
continued to live there and work according to their
strength.

It was profitable to the master to have such people,
for the old folks had themselves been masters and
knew how things should be rightly ordered, and
were not idle but worked according to their ability ;

144

Elias

the only thing which grieved Muhamedshah was to
see people who had been so high fall to such a low
estate.

And it chanced one day that distant relations
came as guests, to Muhamedshah, and a Mullah
came also. And Muhamedshah bade Elias take a
ram and slay it Elias skinned the ram and cooked
it, and set it before the guests. The guests ate the
ram's flesh, drank as much tea as they wanted, and
then fell a-drinking kumis. The guests sat with
their host on down cushions on the floor and drank
their kumis out of little cups, and conversed together,
and Elias went about his work and passed by the
door where they were sitting.

Muhamedshah saw him and said to one of his
guests : " Didst thou see that old man who passed
by my door ? "

"I saw him," said the guest; "is there anything
extraordinary about him ? "

"There is this much extraordinary about him —
that he was once upon a time our richest man — Elias
they called him ; perchance thou hast heard concern-
ing him ? "

" How could I help hearing of him ? " replied the
guest ; " seen it all I have not, but the fame of him
was spread far and wide."

"Well, now he hath nought, and he lives with me
as a servant, and his old woman lives with him and
milks my cows."

The guest was astonished. He clicked with his
tongue, shook his head, and said : " Ah ! 'tis plain
how fortune goes flying round like a wheel. One she

145 K

More Tales from Tolstoi

raises on high, anothershe thrusts down below. Tell
me," said the guest, w is the heart of the old man sore
within him, perchance ? "

" Who can tell ? He lives peaceably and quietly,
and looks well.

"May one converse with him?" said the guest;
" I should like to question him concerning his life."

"Certainly, it is possible," replied the host, and
he shouted from behind the kibitka, " Babad," which
signifies grandfather in the Bashkir language, "go
and drink kumis and call hither the old man ! "

And Elias came to them with his wife. Elias
greeted the guests and the host, recited a prayer, and
squatted down on his knees at the door, and his
wife went behind the curtain and sat down with her
mistress.

They gave Elias a cup full of kumis. Elias drank
the healths of the guests and the host, did obeisance,
drank a little more, and then placed the cup aside.

" Now, tell me, grandfather," said one of the
guests, " I suppose it grieves thee looking at us, to
call to mind thy former life, and to recollect how
fortunate thou wert, and how now thou dwellest in
misery ? "

And Elias smiled and said : " If I were to speak to
thee of good fortune and ill fortune thou wouldst
not believe me — far better it would be if thou didst
ask my old wife concerning this thing. She is a
woman, and therefore what her heart feeleth that her
tongue speaketh; she will tell thee the whole truth
about this matter."

And the guest spake, turning towards the curtain :
146

Elias

" Speak now, old woman ! tell me, how judgest thou
concerning thy former good fortune and thy present
ill fortune?"

And Shem Shemagi answered from behind the
curtain : " This is how I judge : I and my old man
lived together for fifty years ; we sought after happi-
ness and we could not find it, and only now this is the
second year in which we have wanted for nothing,
and we live as working folks and have found real
happiness, and we want nothing else."

The guests were astonished and the host was
astonished ; he even rose up and threw aside the
curtain to behold the old woman. And there the
old woman stood with folded arms, and she was
smiling, and she looked at her old man, and he
smiled also.

And the old woman also said : " I speak the truth,
I jest not : we sought happiness for half a hundred
years, and while we were rich we did not find it at
all ; now that we have nothing left and live among
working people we have found such happiness that
we need nothing better."

" And in what, then, does your present happiness
consist ? "

"It consists in this: while we were rich I and
my old man had not a single quiet hour together,
we had no time to talk, no time to think of our
souls, no time to pray to God. So many cares were
we saddled with. At one time guests came to see
us, and it was a worry what to set before each and
with what presents to gratify them lest they should
speak scornfully concerning us. Then there was the

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More Tales from Tolstoi

trouble of seeing to it that the wolves did not rend
the lambs or kids or that thieves did not chase away
the horses. Even when we lay down it was not to
sleep, for we feared that the sheep might overlay the
lambs in the night You might get up and go about
at night, and no sooner would your mind be at ease
than a fresh worry would arise : how to find hay or
pasturage in the winter time — and so it would go on.
And all this was nothing to the disagreements
between my old man and me. He would say : * We
ought to do this,' and then I would say : c No ! we
ought to do that I ' and so we began to curse each
other, and that was sinful. Thus we lived, and went
on from care to care, from sin to sin, and we found
no happiness in life."

"Well, but now?"

"Now I and my old man rise up together, we
converse lovingly and agree in all things, we have
nought to quarrel about and nought to trouble us —
our sole care is to serve our master. We labour
according as we are able, we labour gladly, so that
our master may have no loss and may prosper. We
come to the house — there is dinner, there is supper,
there is kumis. If it be cold there is the kizyak*
wherewith to warm ourselves, and there are furs.
And there is time, when we wish it, to talk together,
to think of our souls, and to pray to God. For fifty
years we sought happiness, and only now have we
found it."

The guests began to laugh.

But Elias said : " Laugh not, brethren ! this is no

* Dried cow-dung used as fuel by the Bashkirs.
I48

Elias

jest, but human life. And at first my old woman and
I were fools and wept because we had lost our wealth,
but now God hath revealed the truth to us, and
now we also reveal it to you, not for our amuse-
ment but for your good."

And the Mullah said : " These be wise sayings, and
Elias hath spoken the real truth, and all this is
written down in the Scriptures."

And the guests ceased to laugh, and they pondered
these things in their hearts.

149

V.— THE TWO BROTHERS AND THE GOLD

ONCE upon a time, in the days long since gone
by, there dwelt at Jerusalem two brothers ; the name
of the elder was Athanasius, the name of the younger
John. They dwelt on a hill not far from the town,
and lived upon what people gave to them. Every
day the brothers went out to work. They worked
not for themselves, but for the poor. Wherever the
overworked, the sick were to be found — wherever
there were widows and orphans, thither went the
brothers, and there they worked and spent their time,
taking no payment. Thus the brothers went about
separately the whole week, and only met together
in the evening of the Sabbath at their own dwelling.
Only on Sunday did they remain at home, praying
and conversing together. And the Angel of the Lord
came down to them and blessed them. On the
Monday they separated again, each going his own
way. Thus did the brothers live for many years,
and every week the Angel of the Lord came down
to them and blessed them.

One Monday, when the brothers had gone forth to
work, and had parted their several ways, the elder
brother, Athanasius, felt sorry at having had to part
from his beloved brother, and he stood still and

ISO

The Two Brothers and the Gold

glanced after him. John was walking with bent head,
and he did not look back. But suddenly John also
stopped as if he perceived something and continued
to gaze fixedly at it. Presently he drew near to that
which he had been looking upon, and then suddenly
leaped aside, and, not stopping for another instant,
ran towards the mountain and up the mountain, right
away from the place, just as if some savage beast
were pursuing him. Athanasius was astonished, and
turned back to the place to find out what his brother
had been so afraid of. At last he approached the
spot, and then he saw something glistening in the
•sun. He drew nearer- — on the grass, as if poured out
from a measure, lay a heap of gold. And Athanasius
was still more astonished, both at the sight of the
gold and at the leaping aside of his brother.

" What was he afraid of, and what did he run away
from?" thought Athanasius. "There is no sin in
gold, sin is in man. You may do ill with gold,
but you may also do good. How many widows and
orphans might not be fed therewith, how many naked
ones might not be clothed, how many poor and sick
might not be cared for and cured by means of this
gold? Now, indeed, we minister to people, but our
ministration is but little, because our power is small,
and with this gold we might minister to people much
more than we do now." Thus thought Athanasius,
and would have said so to his brother, but John was
by this time out of hearing, and looked no bigger
than a cockchafer on the further mountain.

And Athanasius took off his garment, shovelled as
much gold into it as he was able to carry, threw it

I5i

More Tales from Tolstoi

over his shoulder, and went into the town. He went
to an inn, gave the gold to the innkeeper, and then
went off to fetch the rest of it And when he had
brought in all the gold he went to the merchants,
bought land in that town, bought stones, wood, hired
labourers, and set about building three -houses. And
Athanasius abode in the town three months, and built
the three houses in that town ; one of the houses was
an asylum for widows and orphans, the second
house was a hospital for the sick, the third house
was a hospice for the poor and for. pilgrims. And
Athanasius sought him out three God-fearing elders,
and the first elder he placed over the refuge, the
second over the hospital, and the third over the
hospice for pilgrims. And Athanasius had three
thousand gold pieces still left And he gave a
thousand to each of the elders that they might have
wherewith to distribute among the poor. And all
three houses began to be filled with people, and the
people began to praise Athanasius for all that he had
done. And Athanasius rejoiced thereat, so that he
had no desire to depart from the town. But Athan-
asius loved his brother, and, taking leave of the people,
and not keeping for himself a single coin of all this
money, he went back to his dwelling in the selfsame
old garment in which he had come to town.

Athanasius was drawing near to his mountain, and
he thought to himself: " My brother judged wrongly
when he leaped aside from the gold and ran away
from it Haven't I done much better? "

And Athanasius had no sooner thought this than
suddenly he beheld standing in his path the Angel

152

The Two Brothers and the Gold

who had been sent to bless them, but now looked
threateningly upon him. And Athanasius was aghast
and could only say :

" Wherefore, my Lord? "

And the Angel opened his mouth and said :

"Depart fr^m hence! Thou art not worthy to
dwell with thy brother. That one leap aside of thy
brother's was worth more than all that thou hast
done with thy gold."

Athanasius began to talk of how many poor and
how many pilgrims he had fed, and of how many
orphans he had cared for.

And the Angel said to him:

" That same Devil who placed the gold there in
order to corrupt thee, hath also put these big words
into thy mouth.

And then the conscience of Athanasius upbraided
him, and he understood that what he had done was
not done for God, and he wept and began to repent.

Then the Angel stepped aside from the road, and
left free for him the path in which John was already
standing awaiting his brother. And from thenceforth
Athanasius yielded no more to the wiles of the Devil
who had strewn the gold in his path, and he under-
stood that not by gold, but by good works only, could
he render service to God and his fellow-man.

And the brethren dwelt together as before*

153

VI.— THE CHILDREN WISER THAN THE
ELDERS

THE Holy-Tide fell early. Only in sledges could one
fare quickly along. The snow lay upon the houses,
and in the country the little streams were trickling.
A large puddle was oozing from a manure heap
between two houses into an alley. And two little
children from different houses, one very small and
the other somewhat older, had been drawn towards
this puddle. The mothers of both children had
dressed them in new sarafans.* The tinier child
wore a blue one, the bigger child a yellow one with
a nice pattern. Both had pretty kerchiefs tied round
their heads. The children had gone out after dinner
to the puddle, showed each other their pretty things,
and begun to play. And then the desire seized them
to go splashing about in the water. The little girl
crept down in her slippers to the puddle, but the
elder one said :

" Don't go, Malashka, mother will scold us. But
if you like I'll take off my shoes and you take off
your shoes too."

The children took off their shoes, tucked up their
clothes, and went down to the puddle from different

* A long buttoned frock, without sleeves.

1 54

The Children Wiser than the Elders

sides. Malashka went in over her ankles and cried :

" It is so deep, Akulyushka, I'm afraid."

" Oh, it's nothing. It won't get any deeper, come
straight towards me ! "

They drew nearer. Presently Akul'ka said :

" Look out, Malashka ! don't splash so much ! Go
more quietly ! "

No sooner were the words out of her mouth than
Malashka went plump ! with her foot in the water,
and splashed AkuTka's sarafan all over. The sarafan
was splashed all over, and the water went into the
eyes and nose of Akul'ka also. On seeing the great
stains on her sarafan Akul'ka began to be very
angry with Malashka, scolded her, ran after her, and
would have beaten her. Malashka grew frightened,
saw that she had done mischief, leaped out of the
puddle, and ran off home. Akul'ka's mother passed
by, saw her daughter's sarafan all splashed, and her
bodice all dirty.

"Where have you been, you dirty little wretch ?"
cried she.

" Malashka splashed me on purpose," said she.

Akul'ka's mother seized Malashka and boxed her
ears. Malashka howled so that the whole street
could hear it. Malashka's mother came rushing
out.

" Why do you beat my little one ? " cried she, and
she began to abuse her neighbour.

One word led to another, and the women reviled
one another to their hearts' content. Then the
muzhiks* themselves came out and formed quite a

* Peasants.

155

More Tales from Tolstoi

large group in the street All of them jabbered
together, not one of them would listen to the others.
They cursed and swore, then one of them hit his
neighbour, and there was a general scrummage till
an old woman, Alaska's grandmother, intervened.
She went into the midst of the muzhiks and began
to speak soothingly to them :

"What is this, my kinsmen? Is this the way to
spend your days? We ought to rejoice, and you sin
like this?"

But they did not listen to the old woman, and all
but knocked her off her legs. Nor would the old
woman have pacified them but for Akul'ka and
Malashka. While the women were squabbling,
Akul'ka had dried her little sarafan and came out
again to the puddle in the lane. She picked up a
little stone and began to fill up the puddle with earth
in order to make the water flow over into the street
Whilst she was digging Malashka also came out and
began to help her to dig a channel with a little chip
of wood. The muzhiks still kept on wrangling, and
all the time the water was running into the street
through the channel made by the little girls, running
right to the very place where the old woman was
trying to bring the muzhiks to reason. The little
girls began running one on one side and the other
*>n the other side of the little rivulet they had
made.

" Stop it, Malashka! stop it! " shrieked Akul'ka.

Malashka, too, wanted to say something, but could
not utter a word for sheer laughter.

So the little girls ran along, laughing at the chip

156

The Children Wiser than the Elders

of wood as it bobbed up and down on the rivulet.
And they ran right into the midst of the muzhiks.

The old woman perceived them, and said to the
muzhiks :

" Do ye not fear God that ye wrangle so !
Here are all ye muzhiks quarrelling and striving
together about these very children, while they them-
selves have long ago forgotten all about it, and are
playing together again in all heartiness and loving
kindness. They are wiser than you."

The muzhiks looked at the little girls and they were
ashamed. And then the muzhiks began laughing
at themselves, and separated, each man going to his
own house.

" If ye do not become as little children, ye shall
not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven."

157

VII.— THE DEATH OF IVAN IL'ICH

I.

IN the large building devoted to judicial business,
during the interruption of the session in which the
Meluisky affair was under consideration, the mem-
bers of the Court and the Procurator had assembled
in the cabinet of Ivan Egorovich Shebek, and were
discussing the celebrated Krasovsky affair. Theodor
Vasilevich, waxing warm, proved that there was no
jurisdiction. Ivan Egorovich stuck to his opinion
likewise. Peter Ivanovich, taking no part at first
in the dispute, was simply glancing through the
newspapers.

" Gentlemen ! " said he, " Ivan I rich is dead."

" Impossible ! "

" Read for yourselves, then, here it is," said he to
Theodor Vasilevich, showing him the new number of
the " Gazette," fresh and moist from the press.

Within a black border was printed : " Praskov'ya
Thedorovna Golovina, with heart-felt regret, informs
her relations and acquaintances of the death of her
beloved husband and member of the High Court,
Ivan H'ich Golovin, which took place on the 4th of
February of the current year. The funeral will take
place at one o'clock in the afternoon."

158

The Death of Ivan I rich

Ivan Il'ich was a colleague of the gentlemen
assembled there, and they all loved him. He had
been ailing now for some weeks, and his malady
was said to be incurable. His place had been left
vacant, but the general impression was that, in case
of his death, Aleksyeev might be nominated his suc-
cessor, and either Vinnikov or Shtabel would take
the place of Aleksyeev. Thus, on hearing of the
death of Ivan Il'ich, the first thought of every one
of the gentlemen assembled in that cabinet was :
How would this death affect the members of the
tribunal or their acquaintances in the way of change
of position and promotion ?

"Now I shall certainly get Shtabel's place or
Vinnikov's," Theodor Vasilevich thought to himself.
4t It was promised to me a long time ago, and this
promotion would mean an increment of 800 roubles,
besides office fees."

"I must petition now for the transfer of my
brother-in-law from Kaluga," thought Peter Ivano-
vich. "The wife will be very glad. Now she will
not be able to say that I never do anything for her
relations."

" I never thought he would get over it, I must say,"
said Peter Ivanovich aloud ; " it is a great pity."

" What was really the matter with him ? "

" The doctors can't exactly decide Or, rather, they
have decided, but all their opinions differ. When I
saw him last it seemed to me that he was getting
better."

" So I thought, and I have not seen him for some
time. He was quite collected."

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More Tales from Tolstoi

" What were his circumstances ? "

"It appears his wife has precious little. There's

some trifle, I believe."

" One ought to call. They live a frightful distance

off."

" Far away from you, no doubt, very far."

"Well, you cannot expect me to live in the
suburbs," said Peter Ivanovich, smiling at Shebek.
And they began talking of how great the distances
were in the city, and then resumed the session.

Independently of the potential permutations and
transfers likely to result in official circles from this
death, the mere fact of the death itself of a close
acquaintance excited, as usual, in all who heard it, a
feeling of satisfaction that the hearers survived.

" Ah ! he has died, and here am I alive," was what
everyone thought or felt. Moreover, the close
acquaintances, including the so-called friends of Ivan
irich, on this occasion involuntarily reflected that
now they would have to fulfil the very tiresome
obligations of propriety, and attend the Panikhida*
besides waiting upon the widow with their condo-
lences.

The nearest neighbours were Theodor Vasilevich
and Peter Ivanovich.

Peter Ivanovich was a member of the College of
Jurisprudence, and considered himself under obliga-
tions to Ivan irich.

After communicating to his wife at dinner the news
of the death of Ivan irich, and of the idea and the
possibility of transferring his own brother-in-law into
• Mass for the repose of the soul of the deceased.

160

The Death of Ivan ll'ich

their circle, Ivan Ivanovich sighed sincerely, put on
his frock-coat, and went to the house of Ivan irich.

At the entrance to the quarters of Ivan ll'ich stood
a carriage and two coachmen. Below, in the ante-
chamber, near the coat-stand, leaning against the
wall, was the glazed lid of the coffin, adorned with
tassels and galloon, and furbished up with powder to
look like new. Two ladies in black were taking off
their furs. One was the sister of Ivan ll'ich, whom he
knew, the other was a stranger. Peter Ivanovich's
colleague, Schwarz, was coming downstairs, and
from the top step saw the new arrival ; he stopped
short, and winked at him, as much as to say : " Ivan
ll'ich has made a mess of it ; what have we got to do
with it?"

Schwarz's face, with its English whiskers, and his
long, lean figure in its frock-coat, had, as usual, an
air of refined solemnity, and this solemnity, always
diametrically opposed to the humorous character of
Schwarz, had here a peculiar piquancy. So, at any
rate, thought Peter Ivanovich.

Peter Ivanovich let the ladies go on before him,
and slowly ascended the staircase behind them.
Schwarz did not descend, but remained at the top.
Peter Ivanovich understood why : he wanted to
arrange with him where they were to meet to-day.
The ladies went up the staircase to the widow, but
Schwarz, with his strong lips in a serious pose, and a
waggish look, indicated by a movement of the brows
that the room where the corpse lay was to the right.

Peter Ivanovich, as was always the case with him,
entered with a feeling of uncertainty as to what he

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More Tales from Tolstoi

ought to do there. One thing he was quite certain
of — one should never fail to cross oneself on such
occasions. As to whether it was also necessary to
genuflect, he was not quite sure, so he adopted a
middle course : on entering the room he proceeded to
cross himself, and just made a slight pretence of
genuflecting. As much as this pantomime with his
hands and head allowed him to do so, he glanced
round the room. Two young men, one of them a
gymnasiast, both apparently relatives, were coming
out of the room, crossing themselves. An old woman
was standing there immovably, and a lady, with
pointedly arched brows, was saying something to her
in a whisper. A dyachek* in a cassock, alert and
emphatic, was reading something aloud, with an
expression excluding all contradiction ; the muzhik-
waiter, Gerasim, passing in front of Peter Ivanovich
with light steps, was strewing something on the
floor. No sooner had he noticed this than Peter
Ivanovich was sensible of the faint odour of a corpse.
Last time he had called upon Ivan Il'ich, Peter
Ivanovich had seen this muzhik in the cabinet ; he
served as a nurse, and Ivan IFich was particularly
fond of him. Peter Ivanovich kept on crossing him-
self, and slightly genuflecting in a central position,
between the coffin, the ctyackek> and the images on
the wall in the corner. Presently, when this action
of crossing himself seemed to him to have lasted quite
long enough, he stopped short, and began to look at
the corpse.
The corpse lay particularly heavily, as is the

* Church singer
l62

\

\

The Death of Ivan I rich*

way with corpses, its stark-cold members sinking
inwardly towards the bottom of the coffin, with the
head projecting somewhat from the pillow, and
prominently exhibited, as corpses always do exhibit,
its yellow waxen forehead with the bald patches
on the emaciated temples, and the prominent nose
almost embedded in the upper lip. He had changed
very much. He was even thinner than when Peter
Ivanovich had last seen him ; but, as is the case with
all corpses, the face had become handsomer, more
distinguished looking, than it had been in life — that
was the most noticeable change. On the face there
was an expression which said that what it was
necessary to do had been done, and done rightly.
Moreover, in the expression of the face there was
something besides, either a reproach or a recollection,
of something in life. This recollection seemed to
Peter Ivanovich incongruous, or, at least, inapplicable
to him. He had an unpleasant sort of feeling, and
therefore Peter Ivanovich hastily crossed himself once
more, and, as it seemed to him, much too hastily and
incompatibly with decent observance, and he turned
and went towards the door. Schwarz was awaiting
him in the vestibule, with his legs stretched far apart,
and drumming with both hands on the sides of his
top hat One glance at the humorous, wholesome,
and elegant figure of Schwarz quite refreshed Peter
Ivanovich. Peter Ivanovich understood that he,
Schwarz, stood high above all that, and refused to
submit to depressing influences. A single glance of
his said : The incident of tiaz panikhida of Ivan Il'ich
is absolutely no sufficient occasion for the interruption

163

Mote Tales from Tolstoi

of the recognised order of things ; in other words,
nothing could interfere with the shuffling of a pack of
cards that very evening, and the dealing them out,
while the lackeys were putting four freshly lighted
candles in their proper places ; and, in general,
there was no reason for supposing that this incident
could prevent us from spending together a pleasant
evening to-day as on all other days. He said as
much to Peter Ivanovich as he passed by, and invited
him to join them in a card party at Theodor Vasile-
vich's. But, plainly, it was not the fate of Peter
Ivanovich to amuse himself that evening. Praskov'ya
Thedorovna, a short, fat woman, and, despite every
architectural, effort of her own in the contrary direc-
tion, expanding downwards from the shoulders, all
in black, with a lace hood, and with just the same
strangely raised eyebrows as the lady standing before
the coffin, came out of her apartments with other
ladies, and, conducting them to the dead man's door,
said:

" The panikhida will take place immediately, go
in!"

Schwarz, bowing indefinitely, remained where he
was, obviously neither declining nor accepting this
invitation. Praskov'ya Thedorovna, observing Peter
Ivanovich, sighed, came straight towards him, took
his hand, and said :

" I know that you were a sincere friend of Ivan
inch," and kept looking at him, expecting from him
actions corresponding with these words.

Peter Ivanovich knew that just as it had been
necessary to cross himself a little time ago, so now

164

The Death of Ivan I rich

it was necessary to press the lady's hand, sigh, and
say :

" Believe me, I Was indeed."

And he did so. And, having so done, he felt that
the result desired was obtained — he was touched and
she was touched.

" Come, before they begin in there, I want to have
a little talk with you," said the widow ; " give me
your hand."

Peter Ivanovich gave his hand, and they proceeded
together to an inner apartment, past Schwarz, who
gave Peter Ivanovich a melancholy wink.

" It's all up with our game ! Don't try and come,
we'll look out for another partner," was what his
waggish look said.

Peter Ivanovich sighed, still more deeply and sadly,
and Praskov*ya Thedorovna gratefully pressed his
arm. Entering her drawing-room, tapestried in pink
cretonne, and lit by a dim shaded lamp, they sat down
at the table, she on the divan, and Peter Ivanovich
on a low seat with disordered springs and irregularly
disposed down-stuffing, which gave way beneath him.
Praskov'ya Thedorovna would have insisted on his
taking another seat, but reflected that such insistence
was incongruous with her situation, and thought better
of it As he sat down on the soft cushioned seat,
Peter Ivanovich called to mind how Ivan I rich had
designed the ornamentation of this room, and had
consulted him about the pink cretonne with the
green leaves. As she sat on the divan, after steering
her way round the table (the whole drawing-room,
by the way, was crowded with knick-knacks and

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More Tales from Tolstoi

furniture), the black lace of the widow's black dress
caught in the carving of the table. Peter Ivanovich
started up to unfasten it, and the downy cushion,
freed from the pressure of his body, sprang up and
bumped him. The widow herself stood up, and began
to unfasten her lace, and Peter Ivanovich again sat
down, suppressing the rebellious down-stuffing
beneath him. But the widow did not quite detach
herself, and Peter Ivanovich again rose up, and again
the stuffing rose in rebellion and even the springs
creaked. When everything was at last arranged,
the lady drew forth a clean batiste pocket-handker-
chief, and began to weep. But the episode of the
lace and the struggle with the down cushion had
somewhat cooled Peter Ivanovich, and he sat down
somewhat sulkily. This awkward situation was
interrupted by Sokolov, Ivan inch's butler, with the
announcement that the place in the churchyard which
Praskov'ya Thedorovna had fixed upon would cost 200
roubles. She ceased to weep, and, with a victimised
air, glanced at Peter Ivanovich, and remarked that it
was a heavy price for her to pay. Peter Ivanovich
made a deprecatory gesture, expressing his indubit-
able conviction that it could not very well be other-
wise.

"Pray smoke 1" she said, in a voice at once mag-
nanimous and despondent, and she began discussing
with Sokolov the question of the price of the grave.

Peter Ivanovich, as he smoked, heard how circum-
stantially she inquired about the prices of the different
plots of ground, and fixed upon the one she ought to
take. Then, having settled at last about the plot

166

The Death of Ivan ll'ioh

of ground, she settled about the singers. Sokolov
withdrew.

" I do everything myself," she said to Peter Ivano-
vich, pushing aside the albums lying on the table ;
and observing that the tobacco ash was threatening
the table, she unobtrusively insinuated an ash tray
close to Peter Ivanovich, without interrupting her
conversation ; " I should consider it hypocritical to
assert that I cannot attend to practical things for
sheer grief On the contrary, if anything can, I will
not say relieve, but distract my thoughts— it is this
caring for him."

Again she got ready her handkerchief, as if making
up her mind to weep, and suddenly, as if doing
violence to herself, she shook her head and began to
speak calmly.

" However, I have business to transact with you."

Peter Ivanovich bowed, without allowing free play
to the springs of his cushioned seat, which imme-
diately grew unruly beneath him.

" He suffered terribly at the last."

" Did he suffer very much ? " inquired Peter Ivano-
vich.

" Ah, frightfully 1 At the last he never ceased to
cry out — not for minutes, but for hours at a time*
For three days in succession he cried out without any
variation of voice. It was insupportable. I can't
understand how I managed to stand it ; we could
hear him through three doors. Alas ! What have I
not endured 1 "

"But was he really conscious?" inquired Peter
Ivanovich.

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More Tales from Tolstoi

"Yes," she whispered, "to the very last moment.
He took leave of us a quarter of an hour before his
death, and even asked us to bring Voloda to him."

The thought of the sufferings of the man he had
known so intimately, first of all as a merry child and
schoolfellow, and afterwards, when he had grown up,
as a colleague, despite the unpleasant consciousness
of his hypocrisy and the hypocrisy of this woman,
suddenly terrified Peter Ivanovich. Again he saw
before him that forehead, and the nose pressing upon
the upper lip, and he had a feeling of horror on his
own account

"Three whole days of terrible suffering — and
death. The same thing may befall me, suddenly, at
any moment," he thought, and for an instant he had
a sensation of horror. But immediately, he himself
knew not how, there came to his assistance the usual
reflection that this thing had happened to Ivan H'ich
and not to him ; that it ought not, and could not,
happen to him, and that, by giving way to the thought
of it, he was only giving way to a gloomy tendency
which he ought not to give way to, as Schwarz's face
had plainly declared And having made this reflec-
tion, Peter Ivanovich felt more comfortable, and began
with interest to inquire about the particulars of the
end of Ivan Il'ich, as if death was an accident to which
only Ivan I rich was liable, but he himself was
not

After various discussions about the really terrible
physical sufferings endured by Ivan irich (Peter
Ivanovich learnt these particulars simply because the
torments of Ivan IFich were really upon the nerves of

168

The Death of Ivan I rich

Praskov'ya Thedorovna), the widow evidently thought
it was necessary to come to the point.

"Alas ! Peter Ivanovich," said she, "how hard it is,
how terribly hard, how terribly hard," and she burst
into tears.

Peter Ivanovich sighed, and waited for her to dry
her eyes. When she had dried her eyes, he said:
" Believe in my sympathy ! " And again she began
to talk, and told him what was evidently her real
business with him : it amounted to asking him how
she was to set about obtaining some money from the
Treasury on the occasion of her husband's death.
She pretended to be asking the advice of Peter Ivano-
vich as to getting a pension ; but he saw that she
already knew all about it down to the minutest par-
ticular — nay, knew, what he did not know, the best
means of extorting everything possible from the
Treasury, with her husband's death as a pretext.
What she really wanted to know was, whether it were
possible, somehow or other, to extract still a little
more money than was strictly due ? Peter Ivanovich
tried to devise some such expedient, but, after making
some suggestions, and even, for decency's sake, cursing
the Government for its niggardliness, he said that it
seemed to him nothing more could be got Then she
sighed, and obviously was beginning to cast about for
some means of ridding herself of her visitor. He
understood this, extinguished his cigarette, pressed
her hand, and went into the antechamber.

In the dining-room, with the clocks with which
Ivan irich had been so pleased (he bought them
in a bric-d-brac shop), Peter Ivanovich met the priest

169

Mora Tales from Tolstoi

and some other acquaintances coming to the panikkida,
and he saw a handsome young gentlewoman whom
he also knew, the daughter of Ivan H'ich. She
was all in black. Her slim figure seemed slimmer
than ever. She had a gloomy, resolute, almost
angry look. She bowed to Peter Ivanovich as if lie
were to blame for something. Behind the daughter,
with just the same aggrieved look, stood an acquaint-
ance of Peter Ivanovich, a rich young man, employed
in the Courts, her fianci y as Peter Ivanovich under-
stood. He bowed to them with a dispirited expres-
sion, and was about to make his way into the dead
man's room, when there appeared on the top of the
staircase the figure of the son of the house, the
gymnasiast, frightfully like Ivan H'ich. It was Ivan
H'ich as a youth, as Peter Ivanovich remembered him
when he was a law student. His eyes were all red
with weeping, and just like the eyes of dirty little
boys of thirteen or fourteen. The youth, on perceiv-
ing Peter Ivanovich, began to frown, half severely,
half shamefacedly. Peter Ivanovich nodded to him,
and proceeded into the dead man's room. The
panikkida began — lights, groans, incense, tears, sobs.
Peter Ivanovich stood there, with puckered brows,
gazing in front of him at his feet Not once did
he look at the corpse, and to the very end did not
once give way to softening influences, and was one of
the first to go out. There was nobody in the ante-
chamber. Gerasim, the butler's assistant, came run-
ning out of the room of the deceased, fumbled with his
strong hands over all the pelisses in order to get at
the pelisse of Peter Ivanovich, and handed it to him.

170

The Death of Ivan I rich

"Well, Gerasim, my friend!" said Peter Ivano-
vich, for the sake of saying something, " a sad affair,
isn't it?"

" It is the will of God ; we shall all have to go
through the same thing," said Gerasim, showing his
white, compact, clodhopper teeth, and like a man in
the whirl of strenuous work, he briskly opened the
door, called to the coachman, helped Peter Ivano-
vich to his seat, and sprang back to the staircase, as
if occupied by the thought of all he had still to do.

Peter Ivanovich felt a particular delight in breath-
ing the fresh air, after the smell of the incense, the
corpse, and the carbolic acid.

"Where to?" asked the coachman.

" It is not late. Til go to Theodor Vasilevich's."

And so Peter Ivanovich went. And, in fact, he
found them at the end of the first rubber, so he just
came in time to take a hand.

II.

The past history of the life of Ivan I rich was most
4 simple and ordinary, and most terrible.
y'f- Ivan Il'ich died in his forty-eighjh year, he was
an official in the Law Courts. He was the son of
an official who had made his way in St. Petersburg
through various Ministries and Departments, follow-
ing a career which brings people into a certain
position from which, although it has clearly been
proved that they are unfit for any sort of real service,
they cannot be discharged by reason of their long

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More Tales from Tolstoi

past services and the rank to which they have
attained ; and, therefore, they get fictitious sinecures,
to which by no means fictitious thousands — from
six to ten — are attached, on which they go on living
to an advanced old age.

Such a man was Privy Councillor Il'ya Efimovich
Golovin, a superfluous member of various superfluous
institutions.

He had three sons. Ivan H'ich was his second son.

The eldest son went through the same career as his

father, only in another Ministry, and was already

drawing near to that period of official life which

is rewarded by a lucrative sinecure. The third son

was a failure. He had failed in various places, and

was now employed on the railway; and his father

and his brothers, and, more particularly, his brothers'

wives, not only did not like to meet him, but, except

when it was absolutely impossible to do so, altogether

ignored his existence. Ivan Il'ich was looked upon

as le phenix de la fatnille. He was not so cold and

careful as his elder brother, but not such a desperate

character as the younger. He was the happy

medium — a sensible, vivacious, amiable, respectable

man. He was educated for the law, along with his

younger brother. The younger brother did not finish

his studies, and was expelled from the fifth class, but

Ivan irich did well. In the law schools he was

already what he was to be in the future all his life—

a capable man, gay, good-natured, and sociable, but

severely scrupulous in doing what he considered his

uty and he considered as his duty whatever highly

Placed people looked upon as such. Neither as a

172

The Death of Ivan I rich

youth, nor as a grown-up man, was he ever a place-
hunter, yet there was this about him from his very
earliest years : as a fly is attracted to a candle, so he
was always drawn towards the highest placed people
in his own particular sphere, appropriated their ways,
their views of life, and established amicable relations
with them. All the distractions of childhood and
youth passed him by without leaving any particular
trace upon him ; he yielded to sensuality, to ambition,
and, finally, while in the higher classes, to liberalism,
but always within certain limits, which his feelings
of propriety indicated to him beforehand.

It was while he was a law student that he had
indulged himself in things which he had regarded as
disgusting before he did them, and which filled him
with self loathing at the very time when he was doing
them ;*but, subsequently, perceiving that such things
were done even by people in the highest positions,
and were not considered bad, he himself did not
indeed regard them as good, but simply forgot about
them altogether, and never worried himself by think-
ing about them.

Quitting the schools of jurisprudence when he had
risen to the tenth class, and receiving from his father
money for his uniform, Ivan Il'ich ordered a suit
from the fashionable tailor, Sharmer, hung on his
watch chain a medal with the inscription, respice
finem; took leave of his principals and his instructors ;
dined with his comrades once or twice at Dinons ; and
with a new modish trunk, linen, suits of clothes, toilet
and shaving requisites, and a plaid, ordered and paid
for at the very best shops, he set off for the provinces,

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More Tales from Tolstoi

to take the place of confidential clerk to the Governor
which his father had obtained for him.

In the provinces Ivan H'ich contrived to make his
position as easy and pleasant as it had been in the
schools of jurisprudence. He worked hard, made a
career for himself, and at the same time amused
himself pleasantly and respectably. Occasionally, he
was despatched by the Government on tours of
investigation, always observing a dignified bearing
towards both high and low, always remarkable for
a scrupulous and incorruptible integrity of which
he could not fail to be proud, and satisfactorily
accomplishing every commission entrusted to him,
more especially those relating to the dissenters.

Despite his youth and a natural bias towards light
gaiety, in all business relations connected with the
service he was extraordinarily firm, official, and
even severe ; but in society he was frequently sportive
and witty, and always good-humoured, gentlemanly,
and ban enfant, as his chief and his chiefs wife, with
whom he was always at home, used to say.

There was a liaison with one of the ladies who had
been attracted to the elegant jurist in the provinces ;
there was also a little milliner ; there were also
drinking-parties with casual wing-adjutants, and
excursions into a certain remote street after supper ;
there were also some underhand services rendered
to the chief, and even to the wife of the chief; but
all this was carried off with such an air of good
breeding that it was impossible to give it a bad name,
so it was all put down as a necessary part of the
French postulate, ilfaut quejeunesse se passe. It was

174

The Death of Ivan I rich

all carried on with clean hands, in clean shirts, with
French words, and, the main thing, in the very highest
society, consequently with the sanction of persons of
the highest rank.

This was the course of Ivan Il'ich's life for five
years, and then there was a change in the service.
New judicial departments appeared, and new men
were required to fill them.

And Ivan IPich became one of these new men.

The post of investigating magistrate was offered
to Ivan IPich, and Ivan IPich accepted it, notwith-
standing the fact that this place was in another
Government, and he would have to break off his
existing relations and establish new ones. Ivan
irich's friends showed their appreciation of him ; they
laid their heads together, presented him with a silver
cigarette holder, and off he went to his new appoint-
ment.

As an investigating magistrate, Ivan I rich was
just as comme il faut and gentlemanly as before,
sensibly keeping his official obligations and his
private life quite apart, and inspiring general respect,
as became a civil, servant with * special commission.
Indeed, the office of magistrate was much more
interesting and attractive to Ivan H'ich than his
previous appointment. In his previous appointment
it had been very pleasant in his fashionable uniform,
and with a free and easy gait, to stroll past the
tremulous and expectant crowd of petitioners and
minor q^ficial personages awaiting an audience out-
side, who envied him the privilege of going straight
into the chiefs private room, and sitting with him

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More Tales from Tolstoi

over cigarettes and tea; but there were very few
people who directly depended upon his good pleasure.
Such people were only the subordinate local magis-
trates and the dissenters who overwhelmed him with
petitions, and he loved to converse with such depen-
dent folks politely, nay, almost as a comrade; he
loved to make them feel that he, who could have
crushed them if he liked, preferred to treat them
amicably and in quite a homely way. Then, how-
ever, there were very few of such people. But now
that he was an investigating magistrate, Ivan Il'ich
felt that all, all without exception, even the most
important, self-satisfied people — all of them were in
his hands, and that he had only to write certain words
on a piece of headed paper, and the most important,
self-satisfied person would instantly be brought
before him, either as a criminal or a witness, and,
unless he chose to ask him to sit down, would have
to stand before him and answer his questions. Ivan
irich never abused his authority, on the contrary, he
tried to soften its expression ; but the conscious-
ness of this authority, and of his power to soften it,
constituted, so far as he was concerned, the principal
interest and attraction of his new office. In his own
department, especially in his judicial investigations,
Ivan irich very speedily adopted the plan of ignoring
all circumstances not directly concerning the service,
and of presenting even the most complicated affair in
such a form as only superficially to express it on paper,
at the same time completely excluding his personal
views, and especially observing all the requisite
formalities. This was a new way of doing things.

176

The Death of Ivan I rich

On being transferred to a new town, in the capacity
of examining magistrate, Ivan Il'ich made fresh
acquaintances, contracted fresh ties, established him-
self anew, and adopted a somewhat different tone.
He took up a position of dignified aloofness as
regards the governmental authorities, and chose a
better circle from among the magistrates and rich
gentry dwelling in the town, and adopted a tone of
slight disapproval towards the Government — a tone
of moderate liberalism and enlightened citizenship.
Moreover, without making any change in the elegance
of his toilet, Ivan irich, in his new dignity, ceased to
shave closely, and gave his beard liberty to grow
as it liked.

The life of Ivan IPich in this new town arranged
itself very pleasantly. The society in which he lived,
and which was for ever skirmishing with the Governor,
was good and amicable, his salary was larger, and not
a little delight was added to life in those days by
whist, which Ivan Il'ich now began to play, having
the capacity of playing at cards gaily, with a quick
eye for combinations, and with considerable finesse,
so that, generally speaking, he was always on the
winning side.

After two years of service in the new town, Ivan
irich encountered his future wife. Praskov'ya
Thedorovna Mikhel was a most fascinating, sensible,
brilliant girl, belonging to Ivan Il'ich's own circle.
In the number of his other pastimes and relaxations
from the cares of a magistrate, Ivan irich included
his light and sportive relations with Praskov'ya
Thedorovna.

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More Tales from Tolstoi

Ivan I rich, as a subordinate official, generally
danced, as a judge he only danced on exceptional
occasions. It was, as if he said : Though I have now
different functions, and am in the fifth class, neverthe-
less, if a dance must be danced, I will show that I
can do better than others even in that respect So,
now and then, he would dance of an evening with
Praskov'ya Thedorovna, and it was principally during
these dances that he made a conquest of Praskov'ya
Thedorovna. She fell in love with him. Ivan Il'ich
had no clear, fixed intention of marrying ; but when
the girl fell in love with him, he put himself this
question : " Why, indeed, should I not marry ? "

The girl, Praskov'ya Thedorovna, was of a good old
family, and not bad-looking; she also had a little
property of her own. Ivan Il'ich might calculate on
making a much more brilliant match, yet this was not
a bad match. Ivan Il'ich had his salary, and she, so
he reckoned, had about the same. Her family was
a good one, and she was a gentle, very pretty, and
thoroughly well-principled woman. To say that Ivan
irich married because he was in love with his fiancie,
and found in her a sympathy with his views of life,
would have been as inaccurate as to say that he
married because the people of his circle had approved
of the match. Ivan Il'ich married for two reasons :
it was pleasant to him to acquire such a wife, and, at
the same time, he did what people of the highest
position considered the proper thing to do.

So Ivan I Tich married.

The very process of marriage and the first period of
his wedded life, with the conjugal caresses, the new

L78

The Death of Ivan I Tich

furniture, the new plate, the new linen, right up to the
pregnancy of his wife, passed very well, so that Ivan
H'ich really began to think that his marriage would
not interrupt that light, pleasant, merry, and always
dignified mode of life approved of by society, which
Ivan irich regarded as his own proper life in general,
but would even add to its charms. But now, during
the first months of his wife's pregnancy, there came
to light something so new, unexpected, unpleasant,
difficult, and unbecoming, that he could not have
anticipated it and never could get over it.

His wife, without any occasion for it, or so it
seemed to Ivan irich, and from pure de gaiti de cceur,
as he phrased it, began to destroy the equilibrium
and dignity of his life : without the slightest cause
she began to be jealous, exacted the utmost attention
from him, tried to pick quarrels on all occasions, and
had unpleasant and even coarse scenes with him.

At first Ivan irich did his best to free himself from
the unpleasantness of this situation by adopting the
same easy and dignified way of treating life in general
which had served him in such good stead before ; he
tried to ignore his wife's state of mind, and continued
to live, as before, easily and pleasantly ; he invited
parties of friends to his house, and tried going to the
club and accepting invitations himself. But his wife
on one occasion abused him so coarsely and ener-
getically, and so persistently continued so to abuse
him every time he did not comply with her demands,
evidently determined not to desist till he should have
submitted, or in other words, should have consented
to sit moping at home like herself, that Ivan irich

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grew alarmed. He understood now that conjugal
life — at any rate, conjugal life with his wife — was not
always the same thing as a pleasant and dignified
life; but, on the contrary, often made such a life
impossible, and that, therefore, it was necessary to
compensate himself for the loss of it So Ivan I rich
began seeking such compensation. His official
position was the part of his life which impressed
Praskov'ya Thedorovna the most, and Ivan irich, by
means of his official position and the obligations
resulting therefrom, began a contest with his wife in
her endeavours to limit his independent existence.

The birth of the infant, the various attempts to
nourish it, the various ensuing disappointments, the
illnesses, real and imaginary, of mother and child, in
all of which Ivan Il'ich was supposed to sympathize,
though he knew nothing at all about it — all these
things made it more and more urgently necessary for
Ivan Il'ich to try and form another world for himself
quite outside the family circle.

Thus, in proportion as his wife became more and
more irritating and exacting, Ivan IFich more and
more transferred the centre of gravity of his existence
to his official existence. He began to love his office
still more, and became more ambitious than he had
ever been before.

Very soon, not more than a year after his marriage,
Ivan Il'ich understood that marriage, though generally
regarded as one of the chief commodities of life, is in
reality a very complicated and difficult affair, with
regard to which, if he wished to do his duty, that is
to say, lead the decent sort of life approved of by

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The Death of Ivan I rich

society, he must take up a definite position, as he had
done in his official life.

And Ivan Il'ich succeeded in taking up such
definite position in his married life. He required of
his family life only those domestic commodities, eg., a
dinner, a housewife, a bed, etc, which it was able to
give, and, in particular, that decency of external
forms which is desiderated by public opinion. For
the rest he looked for cheerful amiability, and was
very grateful if he found it. But whenever he en-
countered opposition or peevishness, he immediately
went off to his separate, penned-off world of official
life, where everything was pleasant.

Ivan irich was valued as a good official, and in
three years he was made the colleague of the pro-
curator. Fresh obligations, their importance, the
power of examining everyone before the tribunal
and putting them in prison, the publicity of his
speeches, the success which attended Ivan IPich in his
new capacity — all this made the public service still
more attractive to him.

Children continued to arrive. His wife grew still
more cross and peevish, but the position which Ivan
irich had successfully assumed with regard to his
domestic life made him almost invulnerable to her
peevishness.

After seven years of service in one town, Ivan irich
was transferred to another government as procurator.
They migrated thither ; there was little money, and
his wife did not like the place to which they had
been transferred. The salary was larger, indeed,
than before, but living was also dearer; moreover,

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two of their children died, and therefore family life
became still more unpleasant to Ivan Il'ich.

Praskov'ya Thedorovna, in this new place, re-
proached her husband for every little mishap which
happened. The greater part of the subjects of con-
versation between the husband and wife, especially the
education of the children, led to debates bordering
on quarrels, and quarrels were ready to burst forth
every moment. There remained only those rare
periods of reviving affection which all consorts
experience from time to time, but which do not last
long. These were islets on which they rested for
a time, only to embark again on the sea of covert
hatred, which expressed itself in a mutual alienation.
This alienation might have grieved Ivan Il'ich if he
had considered that it ought not to be, but by this
time he had come to recognise this situation not
only as normal, but as the aim of his domestic exis-
tence. For it had now become his aim to free himself
more and more from these unpleasantnesses, and give
them an inoffensive and decent character; and he
achieved his aim by spending less and less time in his
family, and when he was forced to be there, he tried
to alleviate his position by the presence of strangers.
Ivan Il'ich's chief comfort was that he had his official
employment. In the official world the whole interest
of his life was concentrated. And this interest
smoothed matters for him. The consciousness of his
authority, of the power he had to ruin every man he
wanted to ruin, even the external dignity of his
entrance into Court, and his dealings with his sub-
ordinates, his success before his superiors and his

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The Death of Ivan I rich

subordinates, and, the main thing, his masterly con-
duct of affairs, of which he was quite sensible — all this
delighted him, and together with his intercourse with
his colleagues, dinners, and whist, quite filled up his
life. So, in general, the life of Ivan Il'ich continued
to go on, as he thought it should go on, pleasantly and
becomingly.

Thus, then, he continued to live for seven years.
His eldest daughter was already sixteen ; one more
child had died, and there remained a little boy, a
gymnasiast, the object of discord. Ivan I rich wanted
to devote him to jurisprudence, and Praskov'ya
Thedorovna, to spite him, sent him to the gym-
nasium. The daughter was educated at home, and
promised well ; the lad also did not do amiss with
his studies.

III.

Thus proceeded the life of Ivan IPich for the space
of seventeen years from the time of his marriage. He
was already an old procurator who had rejected
several offers, because he was expecting a more
desirable post, when unexpectedly something dis-
agreeable happened which completely ruined his
tranquil existence. Ivan irich was expecting the
post of chief assessor in a university town, but a
Mr. Goppe had been too quick for him, and got the
place instead. Ivan irich was very angry ; he
began to make reproaches, and quarrel with him and
with his immediate superiors ; a coldness sprang up
between them, and at the next vacancy he was again
passed over.

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This was in the year 188a This particular year
was a very heavy one in the life of Ivan irich. In
this year, it appeared, on the one hand, that his salary
was not sufficient to live upon ; and, on the other hand,
everyone seemed to ignore him, and, greatest, most
cruel injustice of all from his point of view, his
situation seemed to others to be quite what it ought
to be. Even his father considered himself under no
obligation to assist him. He had a feeling that they
were all deserting him, considering his position, with
a salary of 3,500 roubles, quite normal, and even a
lucky one. He alone knew, what with the injustice
that was being done him, and with the eternal jarrings
of his wife, and with the debts he was beginning to
make, living, as he did, beyond his means — he alone
knew that his position was far from normal.

In the summer of this year, in order to economize,
he took leave of absence, and went to spend the
summer with his wife in the country at the house
of Praskov'ya Thedorovna's brother.

Out of service in the country, Ivan IPich, for the
first time in his life, experienced not merely ennui,
but an unendurable depression, and arrived at the
conclusion that to live like this was impossible, and
that it was indispensable for him to adopt some
decisive measure at once.

After passing a sleepless night, the whole of which
Ivan irich spent on the terrace, he resolved to go to
St Petersburg, and try to get transferred into another
Ministry, in order to punish those persons who did not
appreciate him.

On the following day, despite all the remonstrances
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The Death of Ivan I rich

of his wife and brother-in-law, he went to St Peters-
burg.

He went for one special purpose : to solicit a post
with a salary of 5,000 roubles. He was not par-
ticular about the Ministry, or its tendencies, or the
sort of work required from him. All he wanted was
the post — a post worth 5,000 roubles, either in the
Administrative Services, or in a bank, or a railway, or
in connection with the charitable institutions of the
Empress Mary, or even in the Customs — but the
5,000 salary was indispensable, and he was un-
alterably resolved to quit the Ministry where they
did not appreciate him.

And behold ! this excursion of Ivan Il'ich was
crowned by amazing, unlooked-for success. In
Kursk, Th. S. Ilin, an acquaintance of Ivan Il'ich,
was promoted to the first class, and he communicated
by telegram to the Governor of Kursk that a series
of changes was impending just then in the Ministry
to which he belonged, Ivan Semenovich succeeding
to the post of Peter Ivanovich.

The projected change, besides its importance for
Russia, had a particular significance for Ivan Il'ich,
inasmuch as the newly promoted personage, Peter
Petrovich, and evidently his friend, Zakhar Ivano-
vich, were in the highest degree favourable to Ivan
Il'ich, and Zakhar Ivanovich was, moreover, a friend
and colleague of Ivan IPich.

In Moscow the report was confirmed, and on
arriving at St. Petersburg Ivan Il'ich met Zakhar
Ivanovich, and received the promise of a safe place in
his former Ministry, the Ministry of Justice.

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In a week he telegraphed to his wife :

"Zakhar post of Miller on first announcement I
receive the nomination."

Ivan Il'ich, thanks to this change of persons, un-
expectedly received in his former Ministry such an
important place that he stood two degrees higher
than his colleagues : a salary of 5,000, and travel-
ling fees to the amount of 3,000 more. All his rage
against his former enemies and against the whole
Ministry was forgotten, and Ivan Il'ich was com-
pletely happy.

Ivan Il'ich returned to the country more cheerful
and contented than he had been for a long time.
Praskov'ya Thedorovna was also pleased, and a truce
was concluded between them. Ivan Il'ich had a lot
to tell about the respect with which he had been
treated at St Petersburg, and how all they who had
been his enemies had been humbled and now
crouched before him ; how he was envied his new
position, and especially how very much they all loved
him at St. Petersburg.

Praskov'ya Thedorovna listened to all this, and
made as if she believed it, and did not contradict him
in anything, but was busy all the time making her own
plans about the new style of life they should live in
the city to which they had thus been transferred ; and
Ivan Il'ich perceived with joy that these plans were
his plans, that they agreed together, and that his
thwarted life had reacquired a bright and genuine
pleasantness and dignity corresponding with his
wishes.

Ivan IPich arrived in the capital very shortly. He
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The Death of Ivan I rich

had to assume his new office on September ioth, and
besides that he required a little time to settle in his
new home, to remove all his things from the country,
to buy things that were wanted, and see to a good
many other things ; in a word, to establish himself as
he had already made up his mind to do, and as
Praskhov'ya Tedorovna had resolved to do likewise.

And now when everything had been arranged so
comfortably, and when he and his wife had once more
but one common object before them, and, despite the
fact that they lived very little together, harmonised
more amicably than they had ever done since the
first year of their marriage, Ivan H'ich thought
of removing his family at once ; but his sister and
brother-in-law, who had suddenly become particularly
friendly and kinsmanlike towards Ivan irich, would
not hear of it, so Ivan Il'ich had to depart by himself.

Ivan I rich departed then, and the happy frame
of mind produced by his success and his harmonious
relations with his wife, each stimulating the other,
never quitted him the whole time. He hit upon
excellent quarters, the sort of dwelling he and his
wife had long been dreaming about. Lofty, spacious
reception rooms in the old style, a convenient
grandiose cabinet, rooms for his wife and daughter,
a class room for his son — as if expressly designed for
them. Ivan IPich himself undertook all the arrange-
ments, selected the carpets, bought the furniture — old-
fashioned furniture in particular, which (he took care of
that) was in a particularly cotntne il faut style — and
the coverings of the furniture, and it all grew and
grew into the ideal which he had set his mind on

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attaining. When half his arrangements were com-
pleted, the general effect far exceeded his expectations.
It presented that cotnme il faut y elegant, and uncom-
mon character which satisfies every requisite when it is
finished. In his slumbers he pictured to himself the
drawing-room as it was going to be. Looking at
the reception room, still incomplete, he already beheld
the chimneypiece, the ecran> the etagere> those little
chairs scattered about the room, those plates and
plaques on the walls, and the bronzes when they
should all be in their places. The thought pleased
him how he would surprise Pasha and Lizan'ka,
both of whom had taste in these matters. They never
expected anything like this. He had, in particular,
succeeded in discovering and buying cheap old things
which gave to everything a particularly distinguished
character. In his letters he purposely described
everything as worse than it really was, in order to
surprise them the more. All this occupied him so
much that even his new post, much as he loved it,
interested him far less than he had anticipated. At
the sessions he attended he frequently had fits of
absent-mindedness ; he was thinking all the time
whether the curtain-cornices were plain or ornamental.
He was so taken up with this thought that he fre-
quently took the trouble to rearrange the furniture
and Jiang the curtains over again. Once, when he
had mounted a ladder to show the unintelligent
curtain-hanger how he wished the curtains draped,
he stumbled and fell, but being vigorous and alert
he managed to keep his feet, simply knocking his side
against the handle of a frame. The bruise hurt him

188

The Death of Ivan I rich

a little, but the pain soon passed off. All this time,
indeed, Ivan IPich felt particularly bright and well.
He wrote : " I feel that fifteen of my years have leaped
from off my shoulders." He thought he should have
finished in September, but the business dragged on
till the middle of October. By way of compensation,
it was also most excellent ; it was not only he that
said it, everyone who saw it told him that it was so.

In reality, it was the same with him as it is
with all not very rich people who wish to imitate
the rich, and, as a matter of fact, only imitate one
another: silk stuffs, black wood, flowers, carpets,
and bronzes, dark and shining, all that sort of thing
which all persons of a certain class do in order to
resemble all other persons of the same class. And
with him, too, it was all so much alike that there
was absolutely nothing to attract attention, yet to
him it all seemed something especial. When he met
his family at the railway station, he conducted them
to his illuminated, ready prepared quarters, and a
lackey in a white choker opened the door leading
into the flower-bedizened vestibule, and then they
proceeded into the reception room and the cabinet,
and ah'd and oh'd with satisfaction ; and he felt very
happy, and guided them everywhere, imbibed their
praises, and was radiant with satisfaction. That same
evening, after tea, Praskov'ya Thedorovna asked him,
among other things, how he had come to fall, and he
laughed and explained by pantomime how he had
come flying through the air, and had frightened the
curtain-hanger.

" I have not been a gymnast for nothing, anyone
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else would have been killed, and I merely struck
myself here ; if you touch it it pains, but it is passing
away already, it is a simple bruise."

And they began to live in their new dwelling in
which, as always happens when one has had time
to turn round in a new house, they discovered that all
they now really wanted was one more room, and if
they only had more means — for, as usual, they now
discovered that their income was short of a trifle of
some 500 roubles — everything would be very well
indeed. Especially pleasant was the first period of
their residence in the new house, when everything
was not quite complete, and a finishing touch had to
be added or something had to be bought, or ordered,
or re-arranged, or set to rights. And although there
were some disagreements between husband and wife,
both of them were so contented, and there was so
much to be done, that the difference was always
adjusted without any great quarrel. When, how-
ever, there was nothing more to be done, things
began to be a little dull, and one or two little wants
were felt, but by this time acquaintances were made,
habits were formed, and life was full of its occupations.

Ivan irich, after spending the morning in Court,
would return to dinner, and at first his spirits were
good, though he suffered a little from the worries of a
new domicile. Every spot on the table-cloth, on the
silk stuffs, a ragged tassle in the curtains — all these
little things irritated him. He had spent so much
labour on his household arrangements that every
derangement of them was painful to him. Yet, on
the whole, the life of Ivan irich passed as, accord-

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The Death of Ivan I rich

ing to his belief, life ought to pass — easily, gaily,
becomingly. He rose at nine, drank his coffee, read
his "Gazette," put on his demi-uniform, and went
to Court Here was piled up the harness in which
he worked, and he readily adjusted himself to it.
Petitioners, interrogatories in Court, the Court itself,
sessions — public and administrative. In dealing with
all this business, one had to know how to exclude
everything crude — everything relating to life in the
concrete — things which always impede the regular
course of official affairs. It was necessary to guard
against entering into anything but strictly official
relations with people, and official relations had to be
the one occasion for any dealings with them at all,
and the relations themselves could be only official.
For instance, a man might come and desire to be
informed about something. Ivan Il'ich could have no
relations with such an individual except in his official
capacity ; but if his relations with this man were
official, and the terms of them were such as could be
expressed on headed official paper, then within the
limits of such official relations Ivan Il'ich would do
all in his power for the man, and do it most emphati-
cally, and at the same time observe the form of humane
and friendly intercourse in the shape of politeness.
Every cessation of intercourse carried with it the
cessation of every other sort of intercourse. The
capacity of isolating the official side of his character,
so that it never interfered with his real life, was
possessed by Ivan Il'ich in the highest degree, and
long practice, combined with talent, enabled him to
carry it out to such a degree that sometimes he even

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permitted himself, as a virtuoso, and by way of jest,
to intermingle his human and his official relations.
He indulged himself this way because he felt within
himself the power, whenever he pleased, to make
himself purely official again, and reject the human
element Ivan Il'ich managed this not only easily,
pleasantly, and becomingly, but even artistically.
In the intervals of business he smoked, drank tea,
talked a little about politics, a little about affairs in
general, a little about cards, and more than all about
official nominations. And wearied, but with the
feeling of a virtuoso playing his part — first violin in
the orchestra — to perfection, he would then return
home. At home he would find, perhaps, that his
wife and daughter had gone out somewhere, or they
had visitors ; his son was at the gymnasium or pre-
paring his lessons with his tutor, and getting up
what is usually taught at gymnasiums. It was all
very good. After dinner, if there were no guests,
Ivan Il'ich would read a book which might happen
to be much talked about, and in the evening would
settle down to business, that is to say, would read
papers, refer to the statutes, compare statements, and
put them under their proper rubrics. This occupation
neither bored nor amused him. If he felt bored it
was possible to play at vint y but if there was no
vint y business was always preferable to sitting alone
with his wife with nothing to do. Ivan H'ich's chief
delights were the little dinners to which he invited
men and women of high position in the world, and
the intercourse he then had with such persons, though
as for them it was what they were used to every day,

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The Death of Ivan I rich

for Ivan Il'ich's drawing-room was just like any other
drawing-room.

On one occasion they even had an evening party
with dancing. And Ivan IPich was very happy, and
everything went off very well, except for a great
quarrel with his wife about the pastry and sweets.
PraskoVya Thedorovna had her own plans, but Ivan
Il'ich insisted upon getting everything from a good
pastry cook, and ordered a lot of pastry, and the
quarrel arose because a lot of tarts remained over,
and the pastry cook's account came to forty-five
roubles. The quarrel was a big quarrel, and very
unpleasant, because Praskov'ya Thedorovna said :
" You're a silly fool." And he clutched hold of his
head, and at the bottom of his heart he seriously
thought for a moment or two of a separation. But
the evening itself was a happy one. The best society
was present, and Ivan irich danced with the Princess
Trufinova, the sister of the foundress of the celebrated
charitable institution : " Take thou away my grief."
His official delights were the delights of pride, his
official delights were the delights of vanity, but the
real joys of Ivan Il'ich were the joys of playing at
vint. He confessed that after all, and despite what-
ever unpleasantness there might be in his life, the
joy which like a light burned before all others was
to sit down with good players and amiable partners
at vint, four-handed, vint of course (five-handed vint
did not do nearly so well, though Ivan Il'ich pre-
tended that he loved that too), and to play a sensible,
serious game (when you had a good hand), and then
to have supper and drink a glass of wine. And when

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he went to bed after vint, especially when he had won
a little (it was unpleasant to win a good deal), Ivan
irich would lie down to sleep in particularly good
spirits.

Thus they lived. The very best circle formed
around them, and important people and young people
were among their visitors.

As regards the circle of their acquaintances, hus-
band, wife, and daughter were quite agreed, and by
tacit consent they shook off and rid themselves of
all former various acquaintances and kinsfolks — the
rabble, so to speak, who, along with the new people,
flitted about the drawing-room with the new Japanese
plaques on the walls. Very soon the second-rate
friends ceased altogether to flit about their drawing-
room, and only the very best people frequented the
house of the Golivins. Young people came courting
little Lizanka,* and Petrishchev, the son of Dmitry
Ivanovich Petrishchev, the judge, and his sole heir,
began to pay attention to Liza, so that Ivan irich
already began to consult Praskov'ya Thedorovna as
to whether they should let them go out driving
together in a troika, or make a scene? Thus they
continued to live. And everything went on as if it
would ever be so, and everything was very good.

IV.

They were all well. Ivan irich sometimes said
indeed that he had a bad taste in his mouth, and
something was not quite right, but one could hardly
call that illness.

• Little Liza.
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The Death of Ivan Mich

But this little indisposition happened to increase,
and passed, not yet into downright illness, but into a
feeling of constant oppression in the side, accompanied
by lowness of spirits. This lowness of spirits kept on
increasing and increasing, and began to destroy that
easy, pleasant, and decorous manner of life which had
become an institution in the family of the Golivins.
The husband and wife began to wrangle more and
more frequently, and soon all ease and pleasantness
fell away from them, and decorum alone remained,
and that was only preserved with the greatest
difficulty. Scenes again became more and more
frequent between them, and at last there were only
rare occasions when the husband and wife could meet
together without an open rupture. And Praskov'ya
Thedorovna said, and now not without reason, that
her husband was very difficult to get on with. With
her customary habit of exaggeration, she maintained
that he had always had a frightful temper, and that
it was only her good nature that had enabled her to
put up with it for these twenty years. It was true
that now, at any rate, he was the first to begin to
quarrel. His peevishness always began before dinner,
and often, and especially just when he had begun to
eat, after the soup, for instance. He would then
remark that this dish or that was spoilt, and did not
taste as it ought to taste, or his son would put his
elbows on the table, or his daughter's hair was
untidy. And he blamed Praskov'ya Thedorovna for
everything. At first, Praskov'ya Thedorovna was
offended, and said unpleasant things to him, but once
or twice at the beginning of dinner he had flown into

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such a rage that she understood that this was a morbid
condition which expressed itself in him whenever he
partook of food, so she calmed herself, ceased to be
irritated, and merely hastened to finish the meal
as soon as possible. Praskov'ya Thedorovna made a
very great merit of her meekness. Having arrived
at the conclusion that her husband had a frightful
temper, and was making her life wretched, she
began to pity herself. And the more she pitied
herself, the more she hated her husband. She began
to wish that he would die, but she could not wish this
because then there would be no salary. And this
irritated her still more against him. She accounted
herself dreadfully miserable, principally because even
his death would be no deliverance for her, and it
irritated her to conceal this feeling, and this hidden
irritation still further increased her irritation at him.

After one of these scenes, in which Ivan irich had
been particularly unjust, and after which he said,
by way of explanation, that he had certainly been
irritable, but that it was because he did not feel well,
she said to him that if he were ill he ought to be
cured, and insisted that he should go and see a
famous doctor.

He went Everything turned out just as he had
expected, everything was as it always is. And the
expectation and the intrinsic importance of the doctor,
an acquaintance of his, was the same sort of thing
which he knew by experience in the Courts, and the
tapping and the auscultations, and the questions,
demanding foregone and obviously unnecessary
answers, and the doctor's look of importance,

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The Death of Ivan ll'ich

suggesting: Look here, my dear sir, you just rely
upon us, and we'll put everything to rights ; we
know all about it, and will undoubtedly put everything
to rights in one and the same way for everybody you
like, no matter who he is — the whole process was
just the same as it was in the Law Courts. Just as
he in the Law Courts put on an impressive air with
his subordinates, so also did the famous doctor put
on an impressive air with him.

The doctor said : " So and so and so and so proves
that so and so and so and so is the matter with your
inside, but if this is not confirmed by the examination
of so and so and so, then it is necessary to assume so
and so and so and so. If, then, we assume so and so
and so and so, then of course " — and so on and so on.
So far as Ivan irich was concerned, only a single
question was of any importance : " Is my con-
dition dangerous or not?" But the doctor alto-
gether ignored this inconvenient question. From the
doctor's point of view, this question was a silly one,
and not under consideration ; the balancing of con-
tingencies was all that existed for him — kidney
complaint, chronic catarrh, and diseases of the lower
gut, for instance. It was no question of the life of
Ivan I Tich, but it was a dispute as between the
kidneys and the intestines. And this dispute the
doctor, in the most brilliant fashion, before Ivan
irich's very eyes, decided in favour of the intestines,
at the same time making a reservation to the effect
that an examination of his urine might furnish fresh
indications, and that then the affair would be
thoroughly investigated. All this was to an iota

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exactly the same sort of thing that Ivan Il'ich himself
had done thousands of times in the same brilliant
manner when he had had to do with persons before
the Court The doctor made his resumi just as
brilliantly, and triumphantly, nay, even gaily regarded
the doomed man over his spectacles. From the
doctor's resutni Ivan Il'ich drew the conclusion that
he was in a bad way, and that to the doctor, alas !
and to everyone else it was all one, but that he, Ivan
Il'ich, was certainly in a bad way. And this infer-
ence morbidly affected Ivan Il'ich, exciting within him
a feeling of great pity for himself, and of great anger
against the doctor who could be so indifferent in such
an important question.

But he said nothing, but got up, laid his money
on the table, and remarked with a sigh : " We sick
people, no doubt, often ask you doctors untimely
questions, but tell me now, plainly, is this illness
dangerous or not ? "

The doctor regarded him severely with one eye
through his spectacles, as if he would say : Prisoner
at the bar, if you do not keep within the strict limits
of regularly prescribed questions, I shall be obliged to
take measures for your removal from the Court.

"I have already told you what I considered
necessary and befitting," said the doctor. "An
examination will show us anything further." And
the doctor bowed.

Ivan irich left the house slowly, sat down wearily
in his sledge, and went home. All the way there he
never ceased pondering over what the doctor had said,
trying to translate all those involved, obscure, scientific

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sentences into simple language, and read into them
an answer to the question : Am I in a bad way — a
very bad way — or is it nothing after all? And it
seemed to him that the meaning of all that the doctor
had said was that he was in a bad way. Everything
in the streets struck Ivan irich as miserable. The
coachmen were miserable, the houses were miserable,
the passengers and the shops were miserable. This
pain — this dull, dumb pain, never ceasing for an instant,
seemed, taken in connection with the enigmatical
words of the doctor, to have acquired a fresh and
far more serious significance. And Ivan Il'ich now
listened to it with a new and heavy feeling.

He got home, and told his wife all about it His
wife listened, but in the middle of their conversation
his daughter came in with her hat on ; she had
arranged to go out with her mother. With an effort
she prevailed upon herself to sit down and listen to
this tiresome affair, but did not stay long, and her
mother even did not hear it to the end.

" Well, I'm very glad," said his wife, " that now you
will take medicine regularly. Give me the prescrip-
tion, I'll send Gerasim to the chemist" And she
went away to dress.

He scarce breathed so long as she was there, but
when she went out he drew a deep sigh.

"Well," said he to himself, " possibly ifs nothing
yet, after all."

He began to take the medicine, and followed the
directions of the doctor, which were modified in
consequence of the examination of the urine. But,
on one occasion, it so happened that during this

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examination, and in what ought to have been the
course of procedure after it, some blunder, some
confusion took place. It was impossible to get at
the doctor, and it turned out that something had
been done which the doctor hadn't ordered. Either
he had forgotten, or lied, or hidden something from
him.

Nevertheless, Ivan irich continued to follow the
doctor's prescriptions all the same, and in so doing
found for a time some relief.

The principal occupation of Ivan H'ich, ever since
his visit to the doctor, was the exact observance of
the doctor's prescriptions as regards hygiene, the
taking of drugs, and close attention to his malady
and the whole mechanism of his organism. The
chief interests of Ivan Il'ich were people's diseases
and people's healths. When they spoke about ill-
nesses in his presence, or of people who were dying,
or of wonderful cures, or especially of the disease
from which he was suffering, he, trying all the time to
conceal his emotion, listened eagerly, asked questions,
and applied the answers he got to his own case.

His pain did not diminish, but Ivan irich did
violence to his own convictions in order to persuade
himself that he was better. And he was able to
deceive himself so long as nothing excited him. But
no sooner did he have any unpleasantness with his
wife, or any official bother, or bad cards at vint,
then immediately he felt the full force of his illness.
Formerly, he had put up with these little mishaps,
and struggled against them, waiting for things to
right themselves, and for better luck ; but now every

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contretemps floored him, and drove him to utter
despair. He would say to himself: "Look there,
now ! no sooner do I feel a little better, no sooner does
the medicine begin to have a good effect, than this
cursed misadventure or unpleasantness comes along
and spoils everything. . . ." And he was furious
at the misadventure, or at the people who caused him
unpleasantness, and threw him back again ; and he
felt how these bursts of passion took it out of him,
but he could not restrain himself. It would seem as
if it ought to have been quite clear to him that this
exasperation with circumstances and people could
only increase his illness, and, therefore, he ought
not to pay any attention to disagreeable circum-
stances, yet he came to the diametrically opposite
conclusion : he said to himself that he needed quiet,
and was furious at everything which disturbed this
quiet, and flew into a passion at the very slightest
interference. His condition grew even worse when
he took to reading medical books and consulting the
doctor ; but this growing worse was so gradual that
he was able to deceive himself by comparing one day
with another, so slight was the difference from day
to day. But, whenever he consulted the doctor, it
seemed to him that he was going from bad to worse,
and pretty rapidly, too ; yet, notwithstanding this, he
consulted the doctor continually.

This month he visited another medical celebrity.
The second celebrity said almost the same thing as
the first celebrity, only he put the same questions in
a different way. And the consultation with this
celebrity only increased the doubt and fear of Ivan

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Il'iclL A friend of a friend of his — a very good
doctor — diagnosed his malady quite differently, and
notwithstanding that he promised a cure, still further
confused Ivan Il'ich with his questions and directions,
besides confirming his doubts. A homoeopathist
diagnosed the malady differently from any of the
others, and gave him special medicines, which Ivan
Il'ich, in profound secrecy, took for a week. And
after a week, not feeling any relief, and losing con-
fidence both in his former drugs and in his new ones,
he fell into a still more woeful condition. Once a
distinguished lady told him about cures effected by
means of ikons. Ivan Il'ich caught himself listening
intently, and believing in the story as an actual fact
The incident alarmed him. " Is it possible that my
intellect is failing me ? " he asked himself. " Rubbish !
nonsense ! I must not give way to fancies, but must
choose one doctor, and regularly follow his prescrip-
tions. I'll do so, and there's an end of it Til think
no more about it, but will take his drugs for a whole
year. And then we shall see. And now I have done
with all this vacillation!" It was easy to say this,
but impossible to accomplish it All along, the pain
in his side was tormenting him, and, as if growing in
strength, it began to be more insistent ; the taste in
his mouth became stronger, it seemed to him as if a »
disgusting smell proceeded from the inside of his
mouth, and his appetite and strength failed him more
and more. It was impossible to deceive himself any
longer: something strange, novel, and so important,
that nothing of anything like the same importance
had ever happened in Ivan Il'ich's life before, was

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accomplishing itself within him. And he alone knew
of it; all those around him did not or would not
understand it, and thought that everything in the
world was going on just the same as before. This
tortured Ivan Il'ich almost more than anything else.
The people at home, principally his wife and
daughter, who were in the very thick of their social
engagements, did not understand it at all, he could
see that, and were quite offended with him for being
so glum and exacting, as if he were to be blamed
for that. Although they tried to hide it, he could
see that he was in their way, but that his wife had
forced herself to take up a certain attitude with
regard to his complaint, and adhered to it, inde-
pendently of whatever he might say or do. This
attitude of hers was something of this sort : " You
know," she would say to her acquaintances, "Ivan
IFich cannot, like all other good people, strictly
adhere to the doctor's prescriptions. To-day he
takes his drops and eats what he is ordered to
eat, and will lie down a bit ; and then to-morrow,
if I don't look after him, he will forget to take
them ; he will eat sturgeon (which is forbidden him),
and will sit down to cards for a whole hour."

"When did I?" Ivan Il'ich said angrily at
Peter Ivanovich's.

" In the evening with Shebek."

"What does it matter? I cannot sleep for
pain."

" Very well ; whatever may be done, you will never
be cured, and you'll keep on giving us all this
anxiety."

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This extraneous attitude of PraskoVya Thedorovna
towards the sick man, as expressed to others and
to himself, implied that the illness was all Ivan
H'ich's own fault, and was, in fact, a fresh un-
pleasantness which he was causing his wife. Ivan
irich felt indeed that this escaped her involuntarily,
but it was none the easier to bear for all that

In the Courts, too, Ivan irich observed, or thought
he observed, the same strange sort of attitude taken
up towards him. At one time it would seem to
him as if they regarded him as a man whose place
would soon be vacant ; then all at once his friends
would begin to joke with him about his faddiness,
just as if that strange and terrible, unheard of thing
that was going on within him, never ceasing to suck
away at him, and irresistibly dragging him some-
whither, was the most pleasant subject in the world
for jesting. Schwarz especially irritated him by his
sportiveness, vivacity, and comme il faut way of
looking at things, reminding Ivan irich. of what he
was himself ten years ago.

A party of friends would come and sit down with
him to a game at cards, in the lightest, merriest of
moods, and the cards would be sorted and dealt,
and the usual jests would circulate, and suddenly
Ivan irich would be sensible of his sucking pain
and of that bad taste in the mouth, and it would
seem a barbarous thing to him that he could take
any pleasure in the game under such circumstances.

They could all see how hard it was for him, and
they would say to him : " We can stop if you are
tired. You rest a bit."

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Rest a bit ? No, he could not think of resting ;
he would play the rubber.

They were all glum and silent, and Ivan IPich
felt that he had cast this glumness upon them, and
could not dissipate it. Then they had supper and
separated, and Ivan IPich was left all alone with
the consciousness that his life was envenomed, and
that he was envenoming the lives of others, and that
this venom would not lose in intensity, but would go
on penetrating his existence more and more.

And with the consciousness of this, and what is
more, with acute physical pain and even with terror,
he was obliged to lie down on his bed, unable to
sleep for great pain the whole night And in the
morning he had to get up, dress himself, go to
Court, speak, write, and if he did not go he had to
remain for four-and-twenty hours at home, each one
of which was a torment. And he had thus to go on
living on the brink of destruction, without a single
soul to understand and pity him.

V.

And thus a month, two months, passed away.
Just before the new year his brother-in-law came
to town, and stayed with them. Ivan I rich was
at Court. Praskov'ya Thedorovna had gone out
shopping. On entering his cabinet he found his
brother-in-law there, a healthy fellow of sanguine
temperament, unpacking his own trunk. He raised
his head on hearing the footsteps of Ivan irich, and
glanced at him for a moment in silence. This look

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revealed everything to Ivan Il'ich. His brother-in-
law opened his mouth to sigh, and restrained him-
self. This movement confirmed everything.

" Well, I've altered a bit, eh ? "

" Yes . . . there's a change."

And however much Ivan Il'ich might try to bring
his brother-in-law to converse on the subject of
his appearance, his brother-in-law continued to be
reticent Praskov'ya Thedorovna arrived, and the
brother-in-law went to her. Ivan Il'ich locked the
door and began to look at himself in the mirror — full-
face first of all, and after that sideways. He took
up his portrait, in which he was represented with
his wife, and compared the portrait with what he
saw in the glass. The change was enormous. Then
he stripped up his shirt-sleeve to the elbow, regarded
it, let down his sleeve again, sat down on the
ottoman, and grew blacker than night.

"It must not be, it must not be," he said to
himself, sprang up, went to the table, opened some
public document, began to read it, but could not
go on with it. He opened the door and went into
the saloon. The door leading to the drawing-room
was closed. He approached it on tip-toe and began
to listen.

" No, you exaggerate," Praskov'ya Thedorovna was
saying.

" Exaggerate ? Why, surely you can see for your-
self ? He's a dead man, I tell you ; look at his
eyes ! No light in 'em. What's the matter with
him?"

" Nobody knows. Nikolaev (this was the friendly
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The Death of Ivan I rich

doctor) said something or other, but I don't know
what to make of it. Leshchetetsky (this was the
former doctor) said on the other hand . . ."

Ivan irich went away, went to his own room, lay
down, and began to think : " Reins, renal flux," He
remembered all that the doctors had told him, how
his renal mischief had begun, and how it was spread-
ing now here and now there. And by the force of
the imagination he tried to understand this malady,
and how to stop it and cure it. Such a very little
was wanted, it seemed to him. " No, I will go again
to Peter Ivanovich." (This was the friend whose
friend the doctor was.) He rang, ordered them to
get the carriage ready, and prepared to go.

" Where are you going, Jean ? " asked his wife, with
a peculiarly melancholy, and unusually kind expres-
sion.

This unusually kind expression offended him. He
regarded her gloomily.

" I must go to Peter Ivanovich."

He went to this friend whose friend the doctor
was, and with him he went to the doctor. He found
him in and had a long talk with him.

After considering all the anatomical and physio-
logical details which, according to the opinion of the
doctor, accounted for what was going on inside him,
he understood everything.

There was a patch — a tiny little patch in the lower
gut All that could be put to rights. The energy
of one organ could be strengthened by diminishing
the activity of another organ ; healthy processes could
be set going, and all would be made right He was

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a little late for dinner. He had a little dinner,
talked gaily, but for a long time could not settle
down to any occupation. At last he went to his
cabinet and immediately set to work. He read
cases and worked away, but the consciousness that
there was gnawing away at him a postponed,
serious, suppressed something with which he would
finally have to do, never once left him. When
he had finished his work he recollected that this
suppressed thing was the thought of the lower gut
But he did not give way to it, he went to the
drawing-room for some tea. Guests were there, and
there was conversation, and music, and singing, and
the judge whom they wished to be his daughter's
fianct was present. Ivan Il'ich spent the evening,
Praskov'ya Thedorovna observed, more gaily than
the others, but not for a moment did he forget the
weighty, postponed thought of the lower gut. At
eleven o'clock he took leave of his guests, and went
to his own room. Ever since the beginning of his
illness he had slept alone in a little apartment off
his cabinet. There he went, undressed, and took
up a romance of Zola's, but instead of reading
it fell a-thinking. And in his imagination the
much-desired improvement of the small gut was
accomplished. There was re-absorption, suppura-
tion, and the proper functional activity was restored
"That's the whole thing," he said to himself; "all
you've got to do is to assist nature." He remem-
bered that he had to take his medicine, got up, took
it, lay down on his back, waiting for the beneficial
action of the medicine to destroy the pain. " All

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one has to do is to take things calmly and avoid
prejudicial influences, and now, indeed, I really feel
better, very much better." He began to feel his side,
and the contact was not painful. "Yes, I do not
feel it; really I am very much better already." He
put out the light and lay down on his side. The
small gut evidently was righting, readjusting itself.
Suddenly he felt the familiar, old, dragging pain,
the same obstinate, steady, serious pain. And in his
mouth there was the same familiar foulness. His
heart began to throb and his head to grow dull.
" My God ! my God ! M he exclaimed, " again, again,
and it never ceases." And suddenly the thing struck
him from a new point of view. "Lower gut!
inflammation indeed ! " he said to himself. " It is
no question of the intestines, it is no question of
inflammation — it is a question of life and death. Yes,
it used to be life, and now it is drifting away,
drifting away, and I can't stop it. Yes. Why
deceive myself? Is it not quite plain to everyone
but myself that I am dying, and it is only a question
of weeks, of days— it may happen any moment? It
was light, and now it is darkness. Then I was
there, and now I am here. Where?" A cold
shiver came over him — he stopped breathing. He
heard only the beating of his heart

" I shall be no more, what does it mean ? There
will be nothing at all. For where, indeed, shall I
be when I shall be no more? Can it be death?
No, I will not die." He sprang up and would have
lit the candle, fumbled about with tremulous hands,
upset the candle and candlestick on to the floor, and

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again fell back on his pillow. " Why bother ? It is
all one/' he said to himself, gazing into the dark-
ness with open eyes. "Death? Yes, death, and
they know nothing about it, and don't want to know,
and have no pity. They are playing." (He heard
far away, beyond the door, the sound of voices and
music.) " It is all one to them, and yet they must
die too. The fools! 'Twill be a little sooner for
me and a little later for them, that's all ; it will
be all the same in the end. And they are happy.
Brutes!" He was suffocated with rage. And he
was in torments and unendurably wretched. "Can
it be that everyone is doomed to experience this
dreadful anguish ?" He got up.

"I ought not to go on like this, I ought to be
calm and think over everything from the beginning."
And so he began to reflect " Yes, the disease began
like that I bumped my side, and it remained much
about the same as before both that day and the
day after. Then I had a dull sort of pain, and
then it got a little worse, then I had the doctor,
and then came low spirits and anguish, and then
the doctor again, and all the time I was drawing
nearer and nearer to the abyss. My strength begins
to fail. Nearer and nearer. And now I dwindle to
nothing, and there is no light in my eyes. It is
death, and here am I only thinking of my bowels !
I am thinking how to set my bowels in order, and
it is death that is knocking at my door. Can it
really be death ? "

And again terror seized him ; he panted for
breath, bent over and began to search for the candle,

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and knocked the little pedestal-table beside him with
his elbow. It stood in his way and hurt him ; he
flew into a passion with it, pressed upon it still
harder in his anger, and overturned the pedestal-
table. And in despair, and gasping for breath,
he rolled back upon his back awaiting death
immediately.

The guests were departing at that very time.
Praskov'ya Thedorovna was showing them out. She
heard the fall and went in.

"What's the matter?"

"Nothing. I have let something fall unexpect-
edly."

She went out and brought a light. There he lay,
breathing rapidly and heavily, like a man who had
run a mile, looking at her with glazing eyes.

" What is the matter, Jean ? "

"No — no — nothing. It drop — ped. — What can I
say ? She will not understand," he thought to himself.

And, indeed, she did not understand. She got up,
lit his candle, and went out hastily. She had to
take leave of a guest When she came back he was
lying on his back gazing at the ceiling.

" How are you ? — worse, eh ? "

"Yes."

She shook her head and sat dowa

" I tell you what, Jean, hadn't we better send and
see if Leshchetetsky is at home ? "

That meant telling the famous doctor to call, and
not sparing their money. He smiled bitterly and said
no. After sitting a little longer sh£ approached him
and kissed him on the forehead.

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At that moment he hated her with all the strength
of his soul, and with difficulty refrained from repuls-
ing her.

"Good-bye. God grant you may get a little
sleep."

"Yes."

VI.

Ivan I Tich saw that he was dying, and despaired
continually.

In the depth of his soul he knew that he was dying,
but not only did he not become accustomed to it, but
he simply could not understand it — could not under-
stand it at all.

That syllogism which he had learnt in Kizeveter's
logic^ " Caius is a man, all men are mortal, therefore
Caius is mortal," had seemed to him, all his life long,
to apply only to Caius, and to have no reference to
himself. Gaius was a man, man in general, and it
was quite correct as applied to Caius ; but he was not
Caius, he was not man in general ; HE had always
been quite, quite distinct from all other creatures.
Yes, he was Jack with his own mamma and papa,
and with Mita and Voloda and his playthings and
his coachman and his nurse, and afterwards with his
Kitty, and with all the joys, sorrows, and triumphs
of childhood, boyhood, and youth. What had Caius
to do with the smell of that striped leather ball that
he, Jack, loved so much ? Did Caius ever kiss the
hand of a mother as he had done ? Did Caius ever
hear the crinkling of the folds of his mother's silk
dress? Did Caius ever smuggle in tarts during a

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The Death of Ivan I'lich

lesson in jurisprudence? Was Caius ever in love?
Could Caius ever have presided in Court ?

And Caius was certainly mortal, and must die in
the regular course of things ; but as for me, Vanya,
Ivan IFich, with all my feelings and sentiments —
that's quite a different thing. It cannot possibly be
that I must die, that would be too terrible.

Thus did he think within himself.

" If I had to die like Caius, then I should have
known it, then an inner voice must needs have told
me so ; but there was nothing of the sort within me,
and I and all my friends quite understood that we
were quite different from Caius. And now look
here ! " he said to himself. " It cannot be, it cannot
be, and yet it is. What's the meaning of it ? How
shall I understand it ? "

And he could not understand it, and tried to drive
the thought away from him as a false, abnormal,
morbid thought, and to substitute for it other normal,
healthy thoughts. But this thought, and it was not
a mere thought, but as if a reality, came to him
again and remained constantly before him.

And he summoned one after the other to take the
place of this thought other thoughts, hoping to find
a support in them. He tried to return to his former
habit of thought which had formerly obscured from
him the thought of death ; but, strange to say, all
that had formerly obscured, concealed, annihilated the
thought of death, was unable now to produce that
effect. Of late Ivan H'ich had spent a considerable time
in these attempts to revive those "habits of thought
which had obscured the thought of death. " At one

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time," he said, "I will get absorbed in my official
business, I really live for that." And he had gone
to Court driving away from him all doubts ; he had
entered into conversation with his colleagues, and
would sit in his old way, distraught, skimming over
the crowd with a dreamy look, and with both his
hands, growing meagre now, resting on the arm of
his oak chair, and, as usual, he would bend over to
the colleague who was opening the case and whisper
a few words to him, and then, suddenly looking up
and sitting straight in his chair, would pronounce
certain words and begin the business. But suddenly,
in the midst of it all, the pain in the side, paying
no heed to the development of the case, would
begin its sucking action. Ivan H'ich, becoming
aware of it, would drive the thought of it away
from him, but it went on with its business, and
it came forward and stood right in front of him, and
looked at him, and he was turned to stone, the fire
of his eye was extinguished, and he began again
to ask himself : I wonder whether it alone is right ?
And his colleagues and his subordinates noticed with
astonishment and indignation how he, the brilliant,
subtle judge, was getting confused and making
blunders. Then he would grow alarmed and try and
fix his attention, and try, somehow or other, to hold
out till the end of the session, and would return home
with the bitter consciousness that his business in
Court could no longer hide from him what he wanted
to be hidden, that his business in Court could not
deliver him from //. And worse than all else was
this : it drew him towards it, not in order that he

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The Death of Ivan I rich

might do something, but simply that he might look
at it, straight into its eyes, look at it, and helplessly
inert, be inexpressibly tormented.

And escaping from this condition of mind, Ivan
irich would seek relief by interposing other screens
between him and it, and these other screens would
present themselves and for a time seem to deliver
him, but immediately they would not so much be
destroyed as become transparent, as if it was shining
through everything, and nothing whatever could guard
against it.

Once during these latter days he went into the
drawing-room arranged by him, that very drawing-
room where he had had the fall, for the sake of
which — oh, the bitterly ridiculous thought of it ! —
for the sake of arranging which he had sacrificed
his life, for he knew that his malady began with the
contusion he had received there ; well, he entered
the room and perceived that there was a dent in
the japanned table, cut deep in by something or
other. He sought for the cause of it, and found it
in the bronze ornamentation of the album which had
been bent back at the corner. He took the album,
a dear one, which he himself had introduced there
con amore, and was very angry at the carelessness
of his daughter and her friends ; this thing torn too,
these visiting cards all scattered about He very
carefully put everything in order again, and bent
back the ornamentation of the album into its proper
place.

On another occasion the idea occurred to him to
move all this arrangement with the albums over

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into another corner where the flowers were. He
called the lackey; either his daughter or his wife
came to his assistance. They did not agree with
him, they contradicted him ; he wrangled, got angry,
but it all did him good, because he had forgotten
all about it, it was not visible.

But then his wife said, just when he was moving
the things about with his own hands : " Allow me,
let the servants do it, you will only do yourself harm
again," and immediately it flashed through the screen,
he saw it It flashed through, and yet he made
believe that it was hidden, but involuntarily he
became attentive to his side again — there sat all the
same old thing with the same dull old pain, and he
could forget no longer, and it was plainly looking
at him from behind the flowers. What was the good
of it all ?

"Yes, no doubt of it, on this curtain, just as much
as if I had been storming a breach, did I lose my life.
Can it be possible ? How horrible and how stupid !
It cannot be ! It cannot be, yet it is."

He went into his cabinet, lay down, and once more
was alone with it Eye to eye with it, and to come
to terms with it — impossible. He could only look at
it and grow cold.

VII.

How it happened in the third month of the illness
of Ivan Il'ich it is impossible to say, because it
happened insensibly, step by step, but at any rate
this thing did happen : his wife, his daughter, his

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The Death of Ivan I rich

son, his servants, his acquaintances, the doctor, and
especially he himself, knew that the sole interest felt
in him by others was as to how soon he would
finally vacate his place, release the living from the
impediment of his existence, and deliver himself from
his sufferings.

He got less and less sleep ; they gave him opium
and began to inject morphia. But this did not
relieve him. The dull anguish which he experienced
in his semi-conscious condition at first was a simple
relief from its very novelty, but subsequently it
became just as tormenting, and even more torment-
ing than open pain.

They prepared for him special dishes by the
doctor's directions, but all these dishes struck him
as being more and more tasteless, more and more
nauseating.

In order to assist his evacuations, special appara-
tuses were arranged, and every time they were
applied it was a torture to him. And this torture
was increased by the consciousness that another man
had to take part in it.

Yet this very unpleasant business itself brought
some relief to Ivan IFich. The person who always
had to do these things for him was the man-servant,
Gerasim.

Gerasim was a clean, fresh young muzhik, always
bright and merry. At first the sight of this ever
cleanly young fellow, dressed in the Russian fashion,
performing this disgusting office, deeply distressed
Ivan irich.

Once when he had risen from the night-stool
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without strength enough to draw up his pantaloons,
he had sunk into a soft chair, and gazed with horror
upon his exposed impotent calves, with their sharply
defined muscles.

At that moment Gerasim entered in thick boots,
distributing around him a pleasant smell of tar from
his boots and of fresh winter air, walking with a
light, strong step in a clean linen blouse and a clean
cotton shirt, with his sleeves turned up over his
naked, strong young arms, and not looking at Ivan
I rich, and visibly restraining, so as not to offend the
invalid, his sensation of the joy of life which was
beaming in his face, went towards the close-stool.

"Gerasim !" said Ivan ITich feebly.

Gerasim trembled, evidently fearing lest he might
have committed some blunder or other, and with a
quick movement turned towards the invalid his fresh,
good, simple young face, on which a beard was just
beginning to sprout

" What do you want, sir ? "

" I am afraid this is an unpleasant job for you.
Forgive me, I cannot help it."

"Lord, help us!" cried Gerasim with sparkling
eyes, and showing his young, white teeth as he
smiled ; " why shouldn't I do this little job ? You
are so bad, sir."

And with his strong, skilful arms he performed
his usual office, and went out with a light step.
And in five minutes he came back again, stepping
just as lightly as before.

Ivan I rich was still sitting in the chair.

" Gerasim," said he, when the latter had replaced
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The Death of Ivan I rich

the clean, well-washed close-stool, "come hither, if
you please, and help me."

Gerasim came.

" Lift me up. It is hard for me alone, and I have
sent Dmitry away."

Gerasim came. With his strong arms, just as
lightly as he had walked, he embraced Ivan irich
skilfully, lifted him up softly, and, holding him up,
with the other hand he readjusted his pantaloons,
and would have set him down again. But Ivan
Il'ich begged him to carry him to the divan.
Gerasim without an effort, and as if he scarce held
him, led him, almost carrying him to the divan, and
sat him down upon it

"Thanks, how well and cleverly you do every-
thing."

Gerasim smiled again and would have gone away,
but Ivan Il'ich liked to be with him so much that he
did not want to dismiss him.

" Push that chair yonder close up to me, if you
please. No, that one there — under my legs. I feel
easier when my legs are raised."

Gerasim brought the chair, placed it in position
without knocking it against anything, and placed
Ivan Il'ich's feet upon it. It seemed to Ivan Il'ich
that he felt much easier ever since Gerasim had
raised his feet higher.

11 1 feel easier when my feet are higher," said Ivan
11'ich. " Place that cushion there under me."

Gerasim did so. Again he raised Ivan Il'ich's feet
and placed the cushion. Again Ivan Il'ich felt
better so long as Gerasim held up his feet

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As soon as he let them go he felt worse.

" Gerasim," he said to him, " have you got employ-
ment now ? "

"No, none at all," said Gerasim, who had been
learning from the townspeople how to speak with
gentlemen.

" What else have you got to do besides this ? "

"What have I got to do? I have done everything
now, I have only got to chop wood for to-morrow."

M Then go on holding my feet up a little higher —
canjyou ? "

u Why of course." Gerasim raised the feet higher.
And it seemed to Ivan I rich as if in this position he
didn't feel the pain at all.

" And how about that wood, eh ? "

" Pray do not be uneasy about it, we'll manage."

Ivan I rich ordered Gerasim to sit down and hold
his feet, and he talked to him. And it was a strange
thing, but it seemed to him that he was better so
long as Gerasim held his feet

From henceforth Ivan Il'ich used sometimes to
call Gerasim, and get him to hold his feet on his
shoulders, and loved to talk with him. Gerasim did
this easily, willingly, simply, and so good-naturedly
that Ivan Il'ich was touched by it Health, strength,
fulness of life in all other people offended Ivan irich,
but strength and fulness of life in Gerasim did not
fret but soothed Ivan Il'ich.

The chief torment of Ivan Il'ich was falsehood, the
falsehood adopted in some way or other by them
all, that he was only ill and not dying, and that all
he had to do was to keep quiet and get well, and

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The Death of Ivan IIMch

then it would be all right He knew very well that
whatever they might do, nothing would come of it
but still greater torments and death. And this lie
tormented him ; it tormented him that they would
not recognise what they knew and what he knew
to be a fact, but would lie to him about his terrible
position, and wanted him to, and made him, par-
ticipate in this lie.

Lies, lies, all these lies lied about him up to the
very eve of his death ; lies which were bound to
degrade this terrible, solemn act of his death down
to the level of all their visits, curtains, caviare for
dinner — this was a terrible torment for Ivan irich.
And it was a strange thing that many a time, when
they were fooling him like this, he was within a hair's-
breadth of shrieking at them : " Enough of this false-
hood. You know, and I know, that I am dying, so
at any rate cease to lie about it." But he never had
the heart to do this. The frightful, terrible act of
his dying — he could see it plainly — was degraded by
all who surrounded him to the level of a temporary
unpleasantness, an indecency (of the same sort as
how to avoid a man who on entering a drawing-
room disseminates a bad odour), being so degraded
by that same sense of " decency " to which he him-
self had been a slave all his life, he perceived that
none pitied him because none even wanted to under-
stand his condition. Only Gerasim understood that
condition, and was sorry for him. And therefore it
was only well with Ivan Il'ich when he was with
Gerasim.

It was well with him when Gerasim, sometimes
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whole nights at a stretch, held up his feet, and
would not go to sleep, saying: "Pray do not put
yourself about, Ivan irich, sleep a little more ; "
or, when suddenly addressing him with the familiar
thou, added: "As if thou wert not ill, and why
should not I render thee this little service ? "

Gerasim alone told no lies, everything showed that
he alone knew how the matter stood, and did not
consider it necessary to conceal it, and was simply
sorry for his weak, expiring master. On one occa-
sion, when Ivan irich was for sending him away,
he spoke right out : " We must all die, why shouldn't
I take a little trouble ? " said he, thereby expressing
that he made light of his labour, principally because
he was doing it for the sake of a dying man, and
hoped that for him also someone would do the same
sort of work when his time came.

Besides this sort of lying, or in consequence of
it, the most tormenting thing of all for Ivan irich
was the fact that nobody pitied him as he wanted to
be pitied ; at certain times, after long suffering, the
wish would come to Ivan irich, though he would
not willingly have admitted it, that someone might
pity him just as if he were a sick child, and it was
the thing he wished for most of all. He wished that
they would caress him and kiss him and weep over
him a little, just as people caress and soothe children.
He knew that he was an important functionary,
that he had a grizzling beard, and therefore that
it was impossible, and yet he wished it all the same.
In his relations with Gerasim there was something
akin to this. And therefore his relations with

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The Death of Ivan ll'ich

Gerasim soothed him. Ivan ll'ich wanted to weep,
and he wanted others to caress him and weep over
him ; and then his colleague, the functionary Shebek,
comes to see him, and instead of weeping and allow-
ing himself to be caressed, Ivan IFich puts on a
serious, severe, profound expression of face, and, as
far as his inertia will allow him, delivers his opinion
on the significance of the judgments of the Court of
Appeal, and obstinately clings to the subject. This
lie, all around him, and within himself, envenomed
more than anything else the last days of the life of
Ivan ll'ich.

VIII.

It was morning. It was only morning because
Gerasim went away, and Peter the lackey appeared,
extinguished the candles, opened one of the cur-
tains, and began very quietly to tidy up the room.
Whether it was morning or evening, or Friday or
Sunday — it didn't matter which — it was all one and
the same thing: the dull, dragging, torturing pain,
never for an instant still, the hopeless consciousness
of a life that was constantly ebbing, but had not
yet quite ebbed away; the consciousness of death,
the hateful and terrible, ever-advancing death, the
one reality, and yet all this lying going on at the
same time. How could there be any talk here of
days or weeks, or the days of the week ?

" Did you order tea, sir ? "

It is a necessary rule that the gentry should drink
tea in the morning, he thought to himself, but he
only said no.

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"Would you like to be moved on to the divan,
sir?"

He has to put the bedroom in order, and I am in
the way, and I am dirt and disorder, he thought to
himself, but all he said was : " No, leave me."

The lackey still kept bustling about. Ivan IFich
stretched out his hand. Peter approached obse-
quiously. "Do you want anything, sir?"
" My watch."

Peter got the watch, lying under his very arm, and
gave it to him.
" Half-past nine. Are they up ? "
" No, sir. Vladimir Ivanovich (that was his son)
has gone to the gymnasium, but Praskov'ya Thedo-
rovna commanded that they should be awakened if
you asked for anything. Did you want them, sir ? "

" No, it is not necessary." Shall I try a little tea ?
he thought u Yes, bring me some tea."

Peter went towards the door. It was a terrible
thing to Ivan Il'ich to be left alone. How should he
keep the servant a little longer ? Yes, there was his
medicine.

" Peter, give me my medicine. ,,
The medicine might do him good after all, there
was no knowing. He took the spoon and drank it.
No, it was no good. It's all nonsense, deception, he
decided, as soon as ever he had tasted the familiar,
nasty, and hopeless stuff. No, I can believe in it no
longer. But this pain, this pain, why should I have
it ? If only it would stop for an instant. And he
groaned. Peter turned round.
" No, go, bring the tea."

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The Death of Ivan ll'ich

Peter departed. Ivan ll'ich, left alone, groaned,
not so much from pain, horrible as it was, as from
weariness. It was always the same thing over again,
all these endless days and nights. If only it would
be quicker. Quicker ? What did he mean ? Death,
darkness. No, no. Anything was better than death.

When Peter came in with the tea on a tray, Ivan
H'ich looked at him absently for a long time, not
comprehending who he was or what he was. Peter
grew confused at this steadfast gaze, and when Peter
was confused Ivan I rich came to himself again.

" Ah ! " said he, " the tea. Very well, put it down,
only help me to wash and put on a clean shirt."

And Ivan ll'ich began to wash. Breathing heavily,
he washed his hands, his face, cleaned his teeth,
began to comb his hair and to look at himself in the
mirror. It was a terrible thing to him, a peculiarly
terrible thing, to note how closely his hair clung to
his pale forehead.

When he came to change his shirt, he knew that
it would be still more dreadful for him if he looked
at his body, so he did not look at it. But it was
finished at last. He put on a dressing-gown, wrapped
a plaid round him, and sat down in his chair to tea.
For a moment he felt himself refreshed, but no
sooner had he begun to drink the tea than that
taste, that pain, came back again. With an effort
he finished the tea and lay down, stretching out
his legs. He lay down and dismissed Peter.

It was the same thing over again. At one moment
a gleam of hope, the next moment a raging sea of
despair, and all was pain, pain, misery, misery, and

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the same thing over and over again. All this lonely
misery was terrible ; he would have liked to send for
someone or other, but he knew beforehand that it was
still worse when other people were with him. "If
only I might have some more morphine, I might
forget about it I shall tell the doctor that he
must invent something else. To go on like this is
impossible, quite impossible."

An hour or two passed in this way. But now
there came a ring at the vestibule. The doctor
perhaps? Yes, it was the doctor — fresh, brisk,
plump, merry, with that sort of expression which
says : Ah ! ha ! we are a little bit nervous, eh ? but
we'll very soon put all that to rights. The doctor
knows that this expression is quite out of place here,
but he has put it on once for all and cannot lay
it aside again, like a man who has put on a frock-
coat in the morning to go visiting.

The doctor came in rubbing his hands in a brisk,
encouraging fashion.

"I'm cold, there's a healthy frost to-day; let me
warm myself a bit," he exclaimed, as much as to say
you must wait a little bit till I have warmed myself,
and when once I have warmed myself I'll very soon
put things to rights.

" Well now, how are we ? "

Ivan I rich felt that what the doctor really wanted
to say was: How is our little affair going on? but
that feeling it was impossible to say this he said
instead : How are we getting on ? by which he meant
to say : What sort of a night have you had ?

Ivan Il'ich looked at the doctor with an expression
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The Death of Ivan H'ich

of face which really asked him : " Will you never
be ashamed of telling lies, I wonder ? " but the doctor
would not notice the inquiry.

Then Ivan H'ich said : " Just as badly as ever ; the
pain won't go away, and never ceases. If only you
could give me something."

"That's always the way with you invalids. I'm
now pretty well warmed, I think. Even Praskov'ya
Thedorovna, who is always so careful, could make no
objection to my temperature now. Well now, let's
see, how are you?" And the doctor pressed his
hand.

And now, forsaking his former sprightliness, the
doctor, with a serious face, began to examine the
patient, feel his pulse, take his temperature, tap him,
and put his ear to him.

Ivan H'ich was firmly and indubitably persuaded
that all this was nonsense and pure deceit, but when
the doctor, going down on his knees, bent over him
and glued his ear to him, now higher up and now
lower down, and, with a most important countenance,
made various gymnastic evolutions over him, Ivan
H'ich submitted to it as he had submitted to the
speeches of advocates in court, knowing very well all
the time that they were lying all the time, and why
they were lying.

The doctor was still on his knees at the divan, and
still poking away at Ivan H'ich, when the silk dress
of Praskov'ya Thedorovna rustled in the doorway,
and they could hear her reproaching Peter for not
telling her that the doctor had arrived.

She came in, kissed her husband, and immediately
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began to prove that she had been up long ago, and
that it was only owing to a misunderstanding that
she had not been there when the doctor arrived

Ivan Il'ich looked at her, and took her all in, and
her whiteness and her puffiness, and the cleanness
of her hands and neck, and the glitter of her hair,
and the brightness of her eyes full of life, were all
so many causes of reproach against her. He hated
her with all the force of his soul, and her mere
contact made him suffer from an access of hatred
against her.

Her attitude towards him and his illness was pre-
cisely the same. Just as the doctor had taken up an
attitude towards the sick man which he could not
now drop, so, too, she had taken up an attitude
towards him, founded on the assumption that he
would not do anything he ought to do, and it was all
his own fault, and she loved to blame him for it, and
this attitude once taken up she could not drop it.

" He wouldn't listen, you know ; he wouldn't take
things in time, and, above all, he lies in a position
which is very bad for him, with his legs up."

And she told the doctor how he had made
Gerasim hold his feet up.

The doctor smiled with bland contemptuousness.

" What are we to do ? " said he ; " these invalids,
you know, sometimes do have such odd ideas, but
we may forgive him, I suppose."

When the examination was completed, the doctor

looked at his watch, and then Praskov'ya Thedorovna

told Ivan Il'ich that she had done what he wanted,

and invited the famous doctor to come and see him,

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The Death of Ivan H'ich

and they, together with Mikhail Danilovich (that
was the name of the general practitioner), were to
examine him and form an opinion.

"You surely will not object, I am doing this on
my own account," she said ironically, giving him to
understand that hitherto she had done everything
as he wanted it, and that only in this instance she
would not allow him to refuse her. He was silent
and frowned. He felt that this lie enveloping him
was so complicated that it would be very, difficult
to put anything right.

And, indeed, at half-past twelve the famous doctor
arrived. Again there were auscultations and grave
consultations in his apartment and in another apart-
ment, and a lot of talk about the kidneys and the
intestines, and questions and answers with such
important looks that, once more, instead of the real
question of life and death, which was now alone
impending over him, a new question emerged about
the kidneys and the intestines, which, somehow or
other, were not acting as they ought to do, and upon
which organs, in consequence, Mikhail Danilovich
and the medical celebrity fell at once, and made
up their minds to put them to rights.

The celebrated doctor took his leave with a
serious but not a hopeless expression of counte-
nance, and, in reply to the audacious question which
Ivan H'ich put to him, at the same time fixing him
with eyes sparkling with terror and hope, namely,
whether there was any possibility of a cure, the cele-
brated doctor replied that he couldn't guarantee it,
but that it was possible. The look of hope with

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which Ivan Il'ich followed the doctor out was so
piteous that, on perceiving it, Praskov'ya Thedorovna
burst into tears as she passed through the door of
the cabinet to give the celebrated doctor his hono-
rarium.

The good spirits, caused by the encouragement
of the doctor, did not last long. There was the same
room, there were the same pictures, the same curtains,
furniture, vases, and that self-same sick and suffering
body of his. And Ivan IPich began to groan ; they
gave him an injection and he forgot everything.
When he came to himself again it was beginning
to be dusk, and they brought him his dinner. With
an effort he ate a little of the soup ; it was all the
same over again, and then came nightfall as usual.

After dinner at seven o'clock, Praskov'ya Thedo-
rovna came into his room, in evening dress, with her
stout, protuberant bosom, and traces of powder on
her face. That very morning she had reminded him
that they were going to the theatre. It was Sarah
Bernhardt's benefit, and they had a box which he
had insisted upon their taking. Now he had for-
gotten all about this, and her get-up offended him.
But he concealed his vexation when he remembered
that he himself had insisted that they should hire
the box and go, because it would be an intellectual,
aesthetic treat for the children.

Praskov'ya Thedorovna came in well satisfied with
herself, and yet with a guilty air. She sat down
beside him and asked him how he was, simply for
the sake of asking, as he could see, and not for
the sake of finding out, knowing very well that there

230

The Death of Ivan ll'ich

was nothing to find out. Then she began to say
that she was bound to go, though she would give
anything not to go ; but the box was taken and
Elen was going and his daughter, and Petrishchev
(the judicial assessor, his daughter's fianc£)> and that
it was impossible to let them go alone, but that it
would have been much more agreeable to her to sit
at home with him, only he was to promise to obey
the doctor's directions during her absence.

" Yes, and Thedor Dmitrievich (the fianct) would
like to come in and see him. Might he come ? And
Liza?"

" Let them come in if they like."

His daughter came in dressed up, with her bare
young body, the same sort of body which was
causing him all his suffering, and she showed him
her dress. A strong, healthy young girl, visibly in
love with herself, and disgusted with disease, suffering,
and death, as interfering with her happiness.

Thedor Dmitrievich also came in in a dress coat,
with his hair curled d la capoul, with a long, sinewy
neck encircled by a white linen collar, with an
enormous white shirt front and narrow black trousers,
with a tight-fitting white glove on one hand, and an
opera hat

After him crept in, unobserved, the gymnasiast,
also, in his new little uniform, poor little wretch, in
gloves, and with frightful blue lines under his eyes,
the significance of which Ivan IPich knew very
well.

He had always felt sorry for his son, and it was
terrible to behold his frightened and compassionate

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look. Except Gerasim, it seemed to Ivan IPich as
if Voloda alone understood and pitied him.

They all sat down, again they asked him about
his health. Silence ensued. Liza asked her mother
about the opera glass. There was a slight dispute
between mother and daughter as to what had become
of it The dispute ended unpleasantly.

Theodor Dmitrievich asked Ivan IPich whether
he had seen Sarah Bernhardt Ivan IPich did not
at first understand the question, and presently
answered no.

" You have seen her already, I suppose ? "

"Yes, in ' Adrienne Lecouvreur.' "

Praskov'ya Thedorovna said that she was particu-
larly good in that part The daughter contradicted.
An argument began about the elegance and realism
of her acting, that sort of conversation which is
always one and the same thing.

In the middle of the conversation Theodor
Dmitrievich looked at Ivan IPich and was silent
The others looked at him and were silent Ivan
IPich was gazing in front of him with sparkling
eyes, evidently he was angry with them. Evidently
this ought to be put right, but there was no means
whatever of putting it right This silence ought to
be broken somehow. But nobody could make up
his mind to do so, and it was frightfully awkward
to all of them that no convenient lie was ready to
hand, and it was plain to all of them what was
wanted. Liza was the first to make up her mind.
She broke the silence. She wanted to conceal what
all of them were experiencing, but she spoke out

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The Death of Ivan ll'ich

"Well, if we must go, it's high time," she said,
looking at her watch, a gift from her father, and
smiling at her young man with a scarcely noticeable
significant look, which he alone understood, and she
stood up rustling her dress.

Then they all stood up, said good-bye, and went
away.

When they had gone out, Ivan ll'ich felt a little
easier ; the lie was no longer there, it had gone out
with them, but the pain remained. The same con-
tinual pain, the same continual terror had this effect,
that nothing was heavier, nothing was lighter, every-
thing was for the worst

Again, minute after minute, hour after hour, passed
by ; it was the same thing over and over again, and
there was no end to it, and more terrible than all was
the inevitable end.

" Yes, send Gerasim here," he replied to a question
from Peter.

IX.

Late at night his wife returned ; she came in on tip-
toe, but he heard her, opened his eyes, and quickly
closed them again. She wanted to send away
Gerasim and sit with him herself. He opened his
eyes and said : " No, go away."

" You are suffering very much, eh ? "

" Much the same as usual."

" Take some opium."

He consented, and drank it. She went out.

For about three hours he was in a tormenting
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slumber. It seemed to him as if he and the pain
were shut up together somehow in a narrow and
deep black sack, and were getting deeper and deeper
into it and couldn't get out And this horrible state
of affairs was accompanied with great personal suffer-
ing. And he was afraid, and wanted to break out
somewhere and struggled, and wanted help. And
quite suddenly he burst out of the sack and fell
somewhere, and awoke. Gerasim was still sitting at
his feet on the bed, brooding quietly and patiently.
There he was lying with the thin, stockinged feet of
his master raised upon his shoulders ; the light was
still there with the shade upon it, and there, too, was
the same unceasing pain.

" Go away, Gerasim," he whispered.

" It doesn't matter, 111 sit a bit longer."

" No, go away."

He removed his feet, lay with his hand on his side,
and felt very sorry for himself. He continued to lie
like this until Gerasim had gone into the other room,
and then he was unable to contain himself, and wept
like a child. He wept because of his helplessness,
because of his frightful loneliness, because of the
cruelty of people, because of the cruelty of God,
because of the absence of God.

"Why hast Thou done all this? Why hast Thou
brought me hither ? Why, oh why, dost Thou torture
me so terribly ? "

He did not expect an answer, and he wept because
there was no answer, and couldn't be an answer.
The pain rose up again, but he did not move, he
did not call. He said to himself: "Very well, then,

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The Death of Ivan I rich

smite me ! But what for ? What have I done to
Thee ? Why dost Thou smite me ? "

After that he was silent, he ceased not only to
weep, but even to breathe, and became all attention,
as if he were listening not to the voice which speaks
through the lips, but to the voice of the soul, to
the current of thought arising up within him.

"What dost thou require?" was the first clear
notion expressible by words which he heard.

"What dost thou require?" he kept repeating
to himself. " What ? Not to suffer. To live," he
answered.

And again he gave himself up entirely to an
attentive expectation, so intense that even his pain
did not distract him.

" To live ? How do you mean to live ? " asked the
voice of the soul.

" To live as I lived before, well and pleasantly."

" As you lived before, well and pleasantly ? " asked
the voice.

And he began to go over in his imagination
the best moments of his pleasant life. But, oddly
enough, all these best moments of his pleasant life
seemed to him to be quite different now to what
they had seemed then. It was so with all of them
except the recollections of his childhood. There in
his childhood there was something really pleasant,
with which it was possible to live if only he could
go back to it. But there was now no trace of the
man who had experienced this pleasantness, it was
like a reminiscence of someone else.

No sooner did he begin to consider what was
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the result of his life, namely, that actually present
he, Ivan Il'ich, than everything that had seemed
so pleasant thawed away before his very eyes and
turned into nothingness, a nothingness that was
sometimes odious.

And the further away he got from his childhood,
and the nearer he drew to the present time, the more
insignificant and doubtful this pleasantness became.
This began from the time that he was a law student.
Then, indeed, there was still something that was
really good; then there was gaiety, then there was
friendship, then there were hopes. But in the higher
classes these good moments became rarer and rarer.
Afterwards, in the time of his first service at the
Governor's, there were again some good moments ;
these were the recollections of his love for his wife.
Afterwards all this was mixed up, and there was still
less of good in it Still further on there was still
less of good, and the further he went on the less
of good he found.

Then came his marriage — and disillusionment so
unexpectedly . . . and the sensuality of it and
the hypocrisy ! And this dead officialism, and this care
about money, and then a year of it, and two years
of it, and ten, and twenty — and always the same old
thing over again! And the further it went on the
more it savoured of death. "And I going down-
hill so nonchalantly, imagining all the time that I
was going uphilL And so it was. According to
the general opinion I was going uphill, and all the
time life was just as much vanishing from beneath
me. And now I am ready. Let me die !

236

The Death of Ivan ll'ich

" Why is it all so ? Why, indeed ? It cannot be !
It cannot be that life is so senseless, so hideous?
And if it really was so odious and senseless, why die,
and die suffering ? There is something not right."

Possibly I have not lived as I ought to have lived ?
flashed through his head. But how can that be
when I have always done my duty? And imme-
diately he drove away from him this unique solution
of all the riddles of life and death, as if it were
something absolutely impossible.

And what do you want now? To live? How?
To live as you lived in the Courts when the court-
usher announced: "Judgment is going to be de-
livered!"

"Judgment is coming, judgment is coming," he
kept repeating to himself. "Is this the judgment?
And I am surely not guilty ! " he cried aloud with
rage. "What for?" And he ceased to weep, and
turning his face to the wall kept thinking continually
of one and the same thing : " Wherefore all this
horror ? "

But think of it as he might, he could find no
answer. And when, as it frequently did come, the
thought came to him that all this arose from the
circumstance that he had not lived as he ought to
have lived, he immediately called to mind the regular
life he had always led, and drove away that frightful
thought.

X.

Another fortnight had passed. Ivan ll'ich was
now confined to the divan. He would not lie in

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bed, but he lay on the divan. And lying almost
the whole time with his face to the wall, he suffered
continually in his solitude the same inexplicable
sufferings, and kept on thinking the same inexplicable
thought : " What is this ? Can it be true that this
is death?" And the inner voice answered: "Yes,
it is true." — " Wherefore these torments?" — It is
because, not wherefore. Besides and beyond this
there was nothing at all.

From the very beginning of his illness, from the
time that Ivan irich first went to the doctor, his
life had been divided between two opposite inter-
changing tendencies — on the one hand despair and
the expectation of an unintelligible and terrible
death ; on the other hand hope and the absorbingly
interesting observation of the natural processes of
his body; on the one hand was an unintelligible,
terrible death, from which there was absolutely no
escape ; and, on the other hand, there was constantly
before his eyes his bowels or his kidneys, which
temporarily refused to perform their proper functions.

From the very beginning of his illness these two
tendencies were continually superseding each other ;
but the further the disease advanced the more
dubious and fantastic became the physiological ideas,
and the more real the consciousness of approaching
death.

He had only to remember what he had been three
months before and what he was now — he had only
to remember how steadily he had been going down-
hill, in order to destroy every possibility of hope.

During the latter period of the loneliness in which
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The Death of Ivan ll'ich

he was, lying with his face turned to the back
of the divan, that loneliness in the midst of the
populous city, and his numerous acquaintances and
their families, a loneliness more complete than any
loneliness to be found elsewhere, whether it were to
be sought in the bottom of the sea or in the earth
— in the latter period of this frightful loneliness Ivan
irich lived in imagination entirely in the past One
after another the pictures of his past life presented
themselves before him. It always began with what
was nearest in time and went on to what was most
distant — to his childhood, and there stopped. When
Ivan ll'ich thought of the preserved plums which
they were giving him to eat now, he called to mind
a moist, wrinkled plum in his childhood, of its
peculiar taste, and of how his mouth watered when
he got down to the kernel, and along with this
recollection of the taste of the plum there arose a
whole series of other recollections of the same period
— his nurse, his brother, his playthings. "But I
mustn't think of that, it is too painful," said Ivan
irich to himself, and again he transferred his thoughts
to the present time. The buttons on the back of the
divan, and the wrinkles of the morocco reminded
him of something else. " Morocco is dear, it wont
last," his wife had said, " and there had been a quarrel
about that. But the morocco was another morocco,
and there was another quarrel " when we tore papa's
portfolio, and they punished us, and mamma brought
us cakes." And again he lingered over his child-
hood, and again it was painful to Ivan ll'ich, and he
tried to drive it away and to think of something else*

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And now again, together with this series of
recollections, another series of recollections began to
pass through his mind as to how his disease had
grown and increased. It was the same thing; the
further back he went the more of life there was.
There was also more of good in life, and life itself
was fuller. And both these recollections blended
together. As the torments kept on growing worse
and worse, so also all life grew worse and worse, he
thought to himself. There was a bright point far
back in the beginning of life, and after that every-
thing was blacker and blacker and quicker and
quicker. "The pace is in inverse proportion to the
distance from death," thought Ivan Il'ich to himself.
And this image of a stone flying downwards with ever-
increasing velocity fastened upon his mind. Life, a
series of ever-increasing sufferings, was always flying
more and more rapidly towards its end, and that
end most frightful suffering. " I am flying. . . ."
He trembled, writhed, would have resisted, but he
knew already that it was no use resisting; and
again, wearied of looking, yet unable not to look
at what was before him, he gazed at the back of
the divan, and waited and waited for that frightful
fall, jolt, and destruction. " It's no good resisting,"
he said to himself, "yet if only I knew why this
is, and that is impossible. It might be explained
if I were to say that I have not lived as I ought to
have lived, but this I cannot possibly acknowledge,"
said he to himself as he recollected all the correctness,
regularity, and respectability of his life. "It is
impossible to allow that," said he to himself, smiling

240

The Death of Ivan I rich

with his lips as if someone could see this smile of
his and be deceived by it "There is no explana-
tion ! Torment, death. . . . Wherefore ? "

XL

Thus a fortnight passed away. During this fort-
night happened an event which Ivan IPich and his
wife had long wished for. Petrishchev made a
formal proposal for the hand of his daughter. This
happened in the evening. Next day Praskov'ya
Thedorovna went to her husband, meaning to tell
him about the offer of Theodor Petrishchev, but
that same night a change for the worse had taken
place in the condition of Ivan H'ich. Praskov'ya
Thedorovna found him on the same sofa, but in a
new position. He was lying on his back groaning,
and gazing in front of him with a fixed, vacant
look.

She began to speak about his medicine. He
turned his look upon hen She did not finish what
she had begun to say, such anger, especially against
herself, was expressed in that look.

" For Christ's sake let me die in peace," he said.

She would have gone away, but at that moment
her daughter also came in and asked him how he
was. He looked at his daughter as he had looked
at his wife, and in answer to her question about his
health drily said to her that he would very soon
relieve them all of his existence. They were both
silent, sat down for a little, and then went away.

" How are we to blame ? " said Liza to her mother.
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Moi»e Tales from Tolstoi

"We haven't done anything. I am sorry for papa,
but why should he torment us? "

The doctor came at the usual time. Ivan Il'ich
answered him u Yes " and " No," never once ceasing to
regard him angrily, and at the end of the interview
he said :

"You know very well that nothing can help, so
leave it"

" We can relieve the suffering," said the doctor.

" Even that you can't do ; leave it"

The doctor went into the drawing-room and told
Praskov'ya Thedorovna that things were going very
badly, and that there was only one thing— opium —
which could relieve his sufferings, which must be
terrible.

The doctor said that his physical sufferings were
terrible, and that was true ; but still more terrible
than his physical sufferings were his moral sufferings,
and in this was his chief torment

His moral sufferings were due to this circum-
stance: that night, looking at the sleepy, good-
natured face of Gerasim, with its high cheek-bones,
it suddenly came into his head : " What if, in very
deed, the whole of my life, my conscious life, was not
what it ought to be?"

It came into his head that what had seemed to
him before an utter impossibility, namely, that he
had lived his life not as he ought to have lived it,
that this might really be true. It came into his head
that those scarcely noticed inclinations of his to fight
against that which the most highly placed people
regarded as a sovereign good, that those scarcely

242

The Death of Ivan ll'ich

noticed inclinations, which he had instantly driven
away from him, might after all have been the real
things he should have lived for, and that everything
else might not have been so. And his official duties,
and his theory of life, and his family, and his social
and official interests — all this might not have been
the real thing ; he tried to defend it all to himself.
And suddenly he felt all the weakness of what he
was defending. And there was no use defending it.

" And if it is so," he said to himself, " and I am
departing from life with the consciousness that I
have ruined everything that was given to me, and
it is impossible to put it right again, what then ? "

He lay on his back, and began to go over his
whole life anew.

When, in the morning, he saw the lackey and then
his wife, and then his daughter, and then the doctor,
all their movements, all their words, confirmed to
him the terrible truth which had been revealed to
him in the night. He saw in them himself and all
that for which he had lived, and he saw plainly that
it was all not the real thing — it was all a frightful,
immense deception, obscuring both life and death.
The consciousness of this increased his physical
sufferings tenfold. He groaned and flung himself
about, and tore off his clothes ; they seemed to stifle
and oppress him, and therefore he hated them.

They gave him a large dose of opium, he lost
consciousness, but at dinner-time the whole thing
began over again. He drove them all away from
him, and tossed from side to side.

His wife came to him and said : " Jean, my darling,
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More Tales from Tolstoi

do this for me, for me. It can do no harm, and
is often of use. Come, it is really nothing. People
in health often do it"

He opened his eyes widely.

u What, to communicate, eh ? Why ? It is not .
necessary. And besides "

She burst out weeping.

"Yes, my friend, I will call our priest, he is so
kind."

11 Excellent, very well," said he.

When the priest came and confessed him he was
touched, felt a sort of relief from his doubts, and
consequently from his sufferings, and for a moment
hope came back to him. Again he began to think
about his lower intestine and the possibility of curing
it He communicated with tears in his eyes.

When they laid him down after communion he
felt easier for a moment, and again a hope of life
appeared. He began to think of the operation which
lay before him. " I want to live, to live," he said
to himself.

His wife came to ask him how he was. She said
the usual words, and added :

" Now, don't you feel better?"

Without looking at her he answered : " Yes."

Her dress, her attitude, the expression of her
face, the sound of her voice — it all said to him
this one thing: "All that which you have lived for,
and would live for, is a lie and a deception, hiding
from you life and death." And no sooner had he
thought this than a hatred of it all rose up within
him, and together with the hatred, physical torment,

244

The Death of Ivan ll'ich

and with the torment the consciousness of inevitable,
imminent ruin.

The expression of his face when he had said "Yes"
was terrible. On pronouncing this yes he looked her
straight in the face, and with extraordinary quickness,
considering his weakness, he turned over on one side
and cried : " Go away, go away, leave me."

XII.

From that moment commenced the shrieking fit
which lasted for three days, and was so terrible that
it was impossible to hear it without horror even
through two doors. When he had answered his wife
he understood that he was lost, that there could be
no return to health, that the end had come, quite
the end, and although his doubt was now settled,
yet doubt it remained.

" Wo ! Wo ! Wo ! " he cried in various intonations.
He had begun with crying : " I won't, I won't," and
then continued to cry the syllable " Wo " only.

These three days, during which time did not exist
for him, he was struggling in that black sack into
which an invisible, irresistible power had dragged
him. He fought as a condemned criminal in the
hands of the executioner fights, knowing that he
cannot save himself, and every moment he felt that,
notwithstanding all his struggles and exertion, he
was drawing nearer and nearer to that which terrified
him so. He felt that his torment consisted in his
being dragged into this black hole, and still more
in his being unable to creep through it. He was

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prevented from creeping through it by the conscious-
ness that his life was good. This justification of his
life held him as if with hooks, and would not let
him get forward, and tormented him more than
anything else.

Suddenly some sort of force smote him on the
breast and in the side, his breathing became still
more laboured, he struggled forward in the hole, and
there at the end of the hole something or other was
shining. He felt now as one feels in a railway
carriage when one thinks that one is going forward
when one is going backward, and one suddenly
recognises the real direction.

"Yes, it was all what it should not have been,"
he said to himself, "but it doesn't matter. It is
possible, quite possible, to do the right thing. But
what is the right thing ? " he asked himself, and was
again silent

This was at the end of the third day, two hours
before his death. At this very time the gymnasiast
had quietly crept into his father's room, and ap-
proached his bed. The dying man was still shrieking
desperately and throwing his hands about. One of
his hands fell on the head of the gymnasiast The
little gymnasiast seized it, pressed it to his lips, and
burst into tears.

At that same moment Ivan irich came to himself,
saw the light, and it was revealed to him that his life
had not been what it ought to have been, but that it
was still possible to set it right He asked himself:
"What then is the right thing?" and was silent,
listening intently. Then he felt that someone was

246

The Death of Ivan ll'ich

kissing his hand. He opened his eyes and beheld
his son. He was sorry for him. His wife approached
him. There she was with open mouth, and with
undried tears on her nose and cheek, regarding him
with an expression of despair. He was sorry for
her.

" Yes, I am tormenting them," he thought ; " it is
wretched for them, but it will be better for them
when I die." He wanted to say this, but he had not
the strength to pronounce it "But why speak at
all ? One must act," he thought to himself. With
a look he indicated his son to his wife and said :

"Take away ... a pity . . . and thou
also." He wanted to say besides : " Forgive," but
he said : " Never mind," and not being strong enough
to rectify the error he waved his hand, knowing that
HE understood whom it alone concerned.

And suddenly it became clear to him that that
which was tormenting him and would not go away
was suddenly going away all at once and altogether.
He was sorry for them, and he must cease from
paining them. He must deliver them and deliver
himself at the same time from these sufferings.
" What a good and simple thing it is," he thought
"And the pain," he asked himself, "whither has
it gone? Come now, where art thou, oh pain?"
He began to listen intently.

" Yes, there it is. Well, pain, thou mayest depart."

" And death, where is it ? "

He searched for his former habitual fear of death,
and did not find it. " Where is it ? What is death ? "
There was no terror because there was no death.

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Mora Tales from Tolstoi

Instead of death there was light "Just look
now ! " he suddenly cried aloud " What joy ! "

So far as he was concerned, all this had taken
place in a single instant, and the insignificance of
this instant remained unchanged So far as those
present at his death-bed were concerned, his agony
lasted another two hours. Something or other was
heaving in his breast, his extenuated body was
collapsing. Presently the heaving and gasping
became less and less frequent

" It is all over," said somebody over him.

He heard these words and repeated them in his
mind u Death is done with," he said to himself.
M There is no more death."

He drew in his breath, uttered a half sigh, stretched
himself and expired.

248

VIII.— THE PENITENT SINNER

"And he said to Jesus : Remember me, Lord, when Thou comest in
Thy Kingdom. And Jesus said unto him : Verily, I say unto thee,
this day shalt thou be with Me in Paradise." — Luke xxiii. 42, 43.

There was a man who lived in the world for
seventy years, and all that time he lived a life of

> sin. And this man fell sick, and he did not repent.

And when death came, in his last hour, he burst
into tears and said: "Lord, forgive me as Thou
forgavest the thief on the cross!" Scarce had he
succeeded in saying this when his soul departed.
And the soul of the sinner loved God and believed
in His mercy, and came to the doors of heaven.

x And the sinner began to knock and beg to be

admitted into the Kingdom of Heaven.

And he heard a voice behind the door saying:
"What man is this that knocketh at the door of
Heaven, and what deeds hath he done in his
lifetime?"

r And the voice of the Accuser answered, and counted

up all the sinful deeds of this man. And he named
no good deeds at all.

And the voice behind the door answered : " Sinners
cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Depart
hence 1"

* And the man said : " My Lord 1 I hear thy voice,

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but thy face I do not see, and thy name I know-
not"

And the voice answered : " I am Peter the Apostle."

And the sinner said : " Have pity upon me, Peter
the Apostle, and be mindful of human weakness and
the mercy of God. Wert not thou a disciple of
Christ; didst thou not hear His teaching from His very
lips and see the example of His life ? And remember
— when He was afflicted and tormented in spirit, and
begged thee three times not to sleep but to pray,
thou didst sleep because thine eyes were heavy, and
three times He found thee sleeping. And so it hath
been with me.

"And remember, too, how thou didst promise
Him not to deny Him even unto death, and how
thou didst thrice deny Him when they brought
Him before Caiaphas. And so it hath been with me.

M And remember, too, how the cock crew, and thou
didst depart and weep bitterly. So it hath been
with me. Thou can'st not but let me in."

And the voice behind the door of Paradise was
silent

And after no very long delay the sinner again
began to knock at the door and ask to be admitted
into the Kingdom of Heaven.

And another voice was heard to speak from behind
the door, and it said : " What man is this, and what
manner of life did he live in the world ? "

And the voice of the Accuser replied, and recounted
all the evil deeds of the sinner, and named no good
deeds at all.

And the voice behind the door answered : w Depart
250

The Penitent Sinner*

hence ; such sinners cannot live together with us in
Heaven."

And the sinner said : " My Lord, I hear thy voicer
but thy face I see not, and I do not know thy name."

And the voice said to him : " I am King David
the Prophet."

And the sinner did not despair, and did not
depart from the door of Heaven, and began to say •
"Have pity upon me, King David, and remember
human weakness and the mercy of God. God
loved thee and exalted thee in the eyes of the
people. Everything was thine — dominion and glory
and riches and wives and children ; and thou didst
behold from thy roof the wife of a poor man, and sin
awakened in thee, and thou didst take the wife of
Uriah and didst slay Uriah himself with the sword
of the Ammonites. Thou, the rich man, didst take
from the poor man his last little lamb, and destroyed
the man himself. So it hath been with me.

"And remember how, afterwards, thou didst
repent and say : * I acknowledge my faults, and my
sins are ever before me.' So it hath been with me.
Thou can'st not but let me in."

And the voice behind the door was hushed.

And in a little while the sinner again began to
knock at the door and beg to be admitted into the
Kingdom of Heaven. And for the third time a voice
was heard behind the door saying: "Who is this
man, and how hath he lived his life in the world ? "

And the voice of the Accuser answered for the
third time, and recounted all the evil deeds of the
man, and named no good deeds at all.

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More Tales from Tolstoi

And the voice answered from behind the door and
said : " Depart hence 1 Sinners cannot enter into the
Kingdom of Heaven."

And the sinner answered : " Thy voice I hear, but
thy face I see not, and I do not know thy name."

And the voice answered : " I am John the Divine,
the disciple whom Jesus loved."

And the sinner rejoiced and said : " Now thou
can'st not refuse to let me in. Peter and David
might have let me in because they knew the weakness
of man and the mercy of God. And thou wilt let
me in because thou lovest much. Didst not thou,
oh, John the Divine, write in thy book that God is
Love, and he that loveth not knoweth not God?
Didst thou not in thine old age say this one sentence
to the people : ' Brethren, love one another ' ? How
then can'st thou now begin to hate me and drive
me away ? Either deny what thou thyself hast said,
or else let me into the Kingdom of Heaven."

And the gates of Paradise were opened, and John
embraced the penitent sinner, and admitted him into
the Kingdom of Heaven.

252

IX.— THREE DEATHS

I.

It was Autumn. A carriage and a calesche were
proceeding at a sharp trot along the high-road. In
the carriage sat two women. One of them was the
mistress, thin and pale. The other was the maid;
smug, florid, and buxom. Her short dry tresses
peeped forth from under her faded bonnet, her pretty
hand in her torn glove readjusted them from time to
time ; her swelling bosom, covered by a rug, was full
of the breath of health ; her quick black eyes glanced
at one moment out of the window, Jaf. the scurrying
fields, at another stared keiiH^^r^er mistress, or
glanced uneasily at the corners of the carriage.
Before the very nose of the waiting-maid the bonnet
of her mistress, attached to the netting of the carriage,
rocked to and fro ; on her knees lay a lap-dog, her
legs were hunched up, the hand-box standing on the
floor of the carriage and the drumming of her feet
upon it was just audible amidst the creaking of the
carriage-springs and the clattering of the window-
glasses.

With her hands on her knees, and closed eyes, the
mistress rocked softly og the pillows piled up
behind her, and kept on coughing an internal cough,

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at the same time slightly wrinkling her brows. On
her head was a white night-cap, and a blue handker-
chief was fastened round her fresh, white neck. The
straight parting, continuing beneath the night-cap,
divided .the reddish, extraordinarily flat, well-
preserved hair, and there was something dry and
death-like in the whiteness of the skin of this broad
parting. The withered, somewhat yellowish skin
hung somewhat loosely on the delicate and pretty face,
and the cheeks and jaws had a pinkish hue. Her
lips were dry and restless, her travelling cloth dress
lay in straight folds over her shrunken bosom. Not-
withstanding that her eyes were closed, the face of
the mistress expressed weariness, irritation, and
suffering.

The lackey, perched upon the box-seat, was
dozing ; the post-driver, shouting vigorously, whipped
up his sturdy, sweating team of four, glancing around
occasionally at the other post-driver behind him in
•the calesche, who was bawling out just as lustily. The
broad, double traces of the rapidly revolving tyres
extended evenly along in the chalky mud of the road
The sky was grey and cold — a cold mist enveloped the
plain and the road. It was stuffy in the carriage,
which smelt of eau de cologne and dust. The sick
woman stretched back her head and gradually opened
her eyes. Her large eyes were sparkling and of a
very pretty dark colour.

" There it is again," she said, irritably shoving aside
with her pretty, wasted hand the corner of the
crinoline of her maid, which had barely touched her
leg, and her mouth pouted peevishly. The maid

254

Three Deaths

grasped her crinoline with both hands, rose for a
moment on her sturdy legs, and sat a little further
off. Her fresh face had a bright flush upon it The
beautiful dark eyes of the invalid greedily followed
every movement of the maid. Presently the .mistress
rested both arms on the seat of the carriage, and also
tried to raise herself in order to sit up a little higher,
but her strength failed her. Her mouth pouted, and
her whole face wore an expression of impotent, angry
scorn.

"Help me, would you! It is really quite un-
necessary. I can do it myself, only don't load me
with your — what shall I call them — your sacks then —
have a little mercy! Better not touch me at all if
you can't do better than that ! "

The mistress closed her eyes — presently she quickly
raised her eyelids again and glanced at her maid.
The maid, as she returned her gaze, nibbled at her
pretty lower lip. A deep sigh arose from the invalid's
breast, but the sigh ended in a cough. She turned
aside, puckered her brow, and grasped her bosom with
both hands. When the cough ceased she closed her
-eyes again and continued to sit motionless. The
carriage and the calesche entered a village. The
maid drew her plump hand from beneath her jacket
and crossed herself.

"What is it?" asked hex mistress.

" A posting-station, my lady."

"Why did you cross yourself? I ask."

" We passed the church, my lady."

The invalid turned to the window, and began slowly
to cross herself, looking with all her big eyes at the

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large village church, round which the invalid's carriage
was just then passing.

The carriage and calesche stopped together at the
posting-station. Out of the calesche stepped the
sick woman's husband and the doctor, who came up
to the carriage.

" How are you now? " asked the doctor, taking her
hand and feeling her pulse.

"Are you not a little tired, my friend? " inquired
her husband in French. " Don't you want to get
out?"

The maid, looking after her wraps, squeezed herself
into a corner, so as to be as much out of the way of
the conversation as possible.

"Pretty much the same as before, but it doesn't
matter," replied the invalid. "I won't get out"

The husband, after pausing a short time, went into
the post-station The maid, skipping out of the
carriage, tripped lightly on the tips of her toes over
the mud into the open door.

" My feeling bad is no reason why you should not
have your breakfast," said the invalid, smiling slightly
at the doctor, who was standing at the carriage
window. " Not one of them mind me," added she,
as soon as the doctor had, with noiseless step, quitted
her, and darted up the steps of the post-station like
a lynx. " They are well — so it is all one to them.
Oh, my God!"

"I tell you what, Edward Ivanovich," said the
husband, encountering the doctor and pressing his
arms with a merry smile, " I have ordered them to
bring us a drink What do you say to that ? "

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Three Deaths

" Ob, that's all right," replied the doctor.

* And what about her? " asked the husband with a
sigh, lowering his voice and raising his brows.

" I say that she cannot go as far as Italy — please
God she may reach Moscow — especially this weather."

" My God, my God ! What's to be done, then ? "—
and the husband put his hand over his eyes.
" Here ! " he added, addressing the man who was
bringing the drink.

" The idea must be given up," answered the doctor,
shrugging his shoulders.

" But tell me what I am to do ! " insisted the
husband "You know I have done everything to
prevent her. I spoke about my means and about
the children, whom we should have to leave behind,
and about my affairs — 'and she would listen to
nothing. She makes her plans for living abroad just
as if she were quite well. And to tell her of her real
condition ! — well, you might just as well kill her out-
right."

" She's as good as dead already, you ought to know
that, Vasily Dmitrievich. A person can't live when he
has no lungs, and lungs can't grow again. It is
melancholy, miserable. But what's to be done? All
that you and I can now do is to take care that the
rest of the road is as easy as possible. This is now a
case for a priest"

"Ah, my God! you understand my position, how
can I remind her of her last will! Come what may,
I cannot tell her that You know how good she
is. . ."

" Nevertheless, you ought to try and persuade her

257 R

Mope Tales from Tolstoi

to stop till the winter season," said the doctor, shaking
his head significantly — "and then the roads might
be bad."

" Aksusha! Aksusha! " screamed the daughter of
the post-master, throwing a shawl round her head,
and dashing down the muddy back staircase, " come
and look at Lady Shirkinskaya, they say she's going
abroad for breast sickness. I have never seen how
consumptives look before:"

Aksusha leaped across the threshold, and the pair
of them, taking each other by the hand, ran out to
the gate. Slackening their steps, they passed close
to the carriage and stared into the open window.
The invalid turned her head towards them, but,
observing their curiosity, frowned and turned away.

" Little mother! " cried the post-master's daughter,
quickly turning her head round, "how wonderfully
beautiful she used to be, and what is she now !
It is frightful Did you see her — did you see her,
Aksusha?"

" And how lean ! " chimed in Aksusha. * Come, let
us see what is in the bottom of the coach. Look, she
has turned away, and I have not seen half. What a
pity, Masha! "

" Yes, and how muddy it is ! " — and they both ran
back through the gate again.

" I suppose I do look frightful," thought the invalid.
"Oh, only let us make haste, make haste and go
abroad, and then I shall soon pick up again."

"Well, how are you now, my friend?" said the
husband, coming to the carriage, and still chewing
a morsel of something.

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Three Deaths

" Always the same question ! " thought the invalid
"Anyhow, it doesn't seem to interfere with his
appetite."

" Oh, it's nothing ! " she murmured between her
teeth.

" I'll tell you what, my friend, I fear you'll be all the
worse for the journey, especially in this weather, and
Edward Ivanovich says the same thing. What do
you say to turning back home?"
She was too angry to speak.
" The weather may be better presently, we could
postpone the journey, and you would then be better —
we might all go together."

" Pardon me ! If I hadn't listened to you all this
time, I might have been in Berlin by now and quite
well again."

" What was to be done, my angel, you know it was
quite impossible. But if you would only stop at home
for a month say, you would get ever so much better,
I could complete my business, and we might take the
children."

" The children are well, but I am not"
" But, my friend, just think ! What with this
weather, suppose you grew worse on the road . . .
while at home, at any rate . . ."

" Home indeed ! Why, I should only die at home,"
replied the sick woman passionately.

But the word die plainly frightened her — she grew
silent and looked interrogatively at her husband He
cast down his eyes and was silent. The mouth of
the invalid suddenly put on a childish pout and the
tears flowed from her eyes. Her husband covered

More Tales from Tolstoi

bi9 face with his pocket-handkerchief, and withdrew
from the carriage.

" No, I will go," said the invalid, raising her eyes
to heaven, and she folded her arms and began to
mutter incoherently: "Why is it so, why is it so?
My God, my God ! " she said, and the tears flowed
still more violently.

She prayed long and fervently, but her bosom
remained just as sick and sore ; in the sky, in the
fields, on the road, everything remained just as grey
and dull ; and that autumn mist neither denser, nor
thinner, lay just as before over the mud of the road
and over the roofs of the cottages, and over the
carriages and the sheepskins of the post-drivers who,
conversing together with strong and merry voices,
were oiling the wheels of the vehicles and putting
fresh horses to.

II.

The carriage was ready, but the driver still delayed
— he had entered the common room of the post-
ing-station. It was hot, stuffy, dark, and oppressive
in the post-stiation room, which smelt of people, baked
bread, cabbage, and sheepskins. A good many post-
drivers were in the living-room, the cook wfcs busy
about the stove, and on the stove in sheepskins lay a
sick man.

"Uncle Khveder, Uncle Khveder, I say," cried a
young fellow, a post-driver in a sheepskin pelisse and
with his whip in his belt, entering the room and
turning towards the sick man.

"What are you skulking about for, Fedka, eh?"

^5o

Three Deaths

asked one of the other drivers, "don't you know
the carriage is waiting for you? "

" I wanted to ask him for his boots as mine are
busted," replied the fellow, throwing back his hair
and thrusting his gauntlet gloves into his girdle ; " hie,
Uncle Khveder, are you asleep ? " he repeated, march-
ing up to the stove.

"What is it?" sounded a faint voice, and a thin,
red-bearded face peeped over the stove. A broad,
bleached, and wasted hand, covered with hair, with
an effort drew an armyak over a skinny shoulder,
hardly hidden by a muddy shirt " Give me a drink,
brother ! What's the matter? "

The young fellow brought him a pitcher full of
water. "Look now, Teddy," said he, after a pause,
" you won't want these new boots of yours any more
now, give 'em to me. You won't walk about any
more now, will you? "

The sick man bent his weary head over the glazed
pitcher and, moistening his sparse pendent moustaches
in the dark water, drank feebly and greedily. His
touzled beard was not clean, his sunken, turbid eyes
raised themselves with difficulty to the young fellow's
face. On withdrawing from the water he wanted to
raise his arm in order to wipe dry his moist lips but
could not, and dried them on the sleeve of his
armyak* instead. In silence, and breathing heavily
through his nose, he looked straight into the eyes of
the young fellow, rallying all his strength.

" You haven't promised them to anyone else, have
you?" said the youth, "it doesn't much matter.

* A blouse of camel's hair.
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More Tales from Tolstoi

The main thing is, it's mucky out of doors and Fve
work to do, so I said to myself : ' Just ask Teddy
for his boots, he won't want 'em any more, anyhow/
Now, say yourself: what good are they to you?"

Something in the sick man's breast overflowed and
buzzed, he bent over and grave himself up to a throaty
coughing fit which he could not rid himself of.

" Yes, indeed, what good are they to you? " angrily
and unexpectedly croaked the cook, her voice filled
the room: "you haven't stirred from the stove this
month and more, you know you're gone all to pieces ;
why, your inside is all wrong, didn't you hear it just
now? What does he want with new boots, he won't
be buried in them, I suppose ? And it's high time I
think for you to pray the Lord to forgive you your
sins. You're gone all to pieces I say. You can't take
him from one room to another or anywhere else.
I hear there are hospitals in town, but what's the
good of that? — every corner is occupied, and he's
about done for. There's no room for you, anyhow,
and besides, they like to have clean folks."

"Hello, Serega! take your place, the gentlefolks
are waiting!" the voice of the post-station starosta
shouted in at the door.

Serega would have gone out without waiting for an
answer, but he could see by the eyes of the sick man
all the time he was coughing that he wanted to say
something.

" You may take the boots, Serega ! " said he,
suppressing the cough and breathing a little more
freely, " but listen ! buy me a head-stone when I die,"
he added hoarsely.

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Three Deaths

"Thanks, uncle! Then I may take them, eh?
And a head-stone, eh ? Yes, yes, I'll buy one for you."

" There, you hear what he says, my children ? " the
sick man was able to bring out, and then he bent
down again, stifled by a recurring cough.

"Ye9, it's a bargain, we have heard," said one of
the drivers.

" Come, Serega, take your seat," said the starosta,
looking in again, "Lady Shirkinskaya is ill, you
know."

Serega quickly divested himself of his big, worn-
out, bulgy boots, and pitched them under a bench.
The new boots of Uncle Khveder fitted him at the
first try on, and Serega, glancing down at them as he
departed, went out to the carriage.

" Those are something like boots ; let me give them
a polish," said the driver, with the polishing-brush in
his hands, as Serega, mounting on to the box, took
the reins. " Did you get 'em for nothing? "

" Looks like, doesn't it? " replied Serega, standing
up and arranging the folds of his yarmak round his
legs. " And now, off you go, my beauties ! " he cried
to the horses, cracking his whip, and the carriage and
the calesche with their passengers, trunks, and
baggage, vanished in the grey autumn mist, rolling
quickly along the wet road.

The sick driver remained in the stuffy room on the
stove, and without coughing his cough out, with an
effort tinned upon the other side and was quiet.

People came in and went out of the room and had
their meals in the room till evening, and all that time
the sick man did not utter a sound. At nightfall the

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More Tales from Tolstoi

cook came to the stove, and pulled out the tulup*
from beneath bis legs.

" Don't be angry, Nastasia," muttered the sick man,
" but I beg of you to let me have your corner."

"All right, all right! Of course! what does it
matter ! " growled Nastasia, " but tell me, uncle, where
does it hurt you?"

"All my inside is queer. God knows what's the
matter."

"Never mind! Does your throat hurt you when
you cough?"

" I ache all over. Fm going to die, that's what it
is ; oh, oh, oh ! " groaned the sick man.

" Cover up your feet, that's what you've got to do,"
said Nastasia, coming down from the stove and
spreading the yarmak over him on her way down.

During the night the night-lamp faintly lit the
room. Nastasia and ten of the drivers slept on the
floor or on benches, snoring loudly. Only the sick
man feebly moaned, coughed, and turned from side
to side upon the stove. By the morning he was quite
stilL

" I had such an odd dream last night," said the
cook, stretching herself in the dim half-light of dawn,
next morning ; " it seemed to me as if I saw Uncle
Khveder come down from the stove and go out to
chop wood 'How can I help you, Nassy? ' says he,
and I said to him, ' Why don't you go out and chop
wood? ' So he takes up the chopper and begins to
chop wood, chopping it so quickly that the splinters
flew about in every direction. 'Why, how's this?'

* A sheepskin pelisse.
264

Three Deaths

says I ; ' you were so ill/ ' No/ says he, ' I am well/
and as he kept moving his hands, a great terror fell
upon me, and I shrieked and awoke. He can't be
dead, surely? Uncle Khveder, Uncle Khveder, I
say!"

But no sound came from Theodore.

" Surely he's not dead? Let's go and see! " said
one of the drowsy drivers half awake.

The wasted hand, hanging down from the stove
and covered with reddish hair, was cold and white.

" Go and tell the inspector ! He seems to be dead/'
said the driver.

Theodore had no kinsfolk — he had outlived them
all. Next day they buried him in the new church-
yard behind the wood; and for the next few days
Nastasia kept telling everyone of the strange vision
she had seen and how she had been the first to miss
Uncle Theodore.

III.

Spring had come. In the wet streets of the town,
among the frozen manure-heaps gurgled scurrying
streamlets; the colours of the ^fihents and the~cori-
versation of the people moving about the town were
bright and cheerful. ; In the little gardens behind the
' fences the buds of the trees were bursting forth, and
their branches were rocked almost audibly by the
fresh breezes. There was a universal thaw, a
constant dripping of transparent drops. The sparrows
were chirping tumultuously and darting about on their
tiny wings. On the sunny side of the road, behind

265

More Tales from Tolstoi

fences, in town houses and country houses, everything
was light and motion. In the sky, on the earth, and
in the heart of man, youth and happiness revived.

In one of the principal streets, in front of a gentle-
man's mansion, fresh straw had been laid down ; in
the house was that selfsame dying invalid who had
been so eager to go abroad.

At the closed doors of the bedchamber stood the
husband of the invalid and a portly woman. On the
divan sat a priest with dejected eyes, holding some-
thing wrapped up in an epitrachilion. In a large
arm-chair in a corner lay an old woman, the mother
of the invalid, weeping convulsively. By her side
stood a maid holding in her hand a clean pocket-
handkerchief, and waiting till the old woman asked
for it; another maid was rubbing the old woman's
temples with something or other, and blowing under
her cap among her grey hairs.

"Well, Christ be with you, my friend," said the
husband to the stout woman standing by his side
at the door (his wife's sister), "she has such
confidence in you ; you know how to talk to her, you
see, so go in and persuade her nicely, my dear." He
would have opened the door for her there and then,
but the sister prevented him, at the same time
dabbing her eyes with her handkerchief and shaking
her head.

" Well, I don't look now as if I had been crying,"
said she, and, opening the door herself, she went in.

The husband was violently agitated, and seemed
quite distraught He made his way towards the old
woman, but before he had taken more than a few

266

Three Deaths

paces, he turned back, walked across the room and
approached the priest The priest looked up at him,
raised his brows to heaven and sighed. His thick,
grizzled beard rose aloft and sank down again
simultaneously.

" My God ! my God ! " said the husband.

"What's to be done? " said the priest sighing, and
again his brows and his beard rose and fell

" And her mother there ! " said the husband
desperately. " It is more than she cam bear. How
she did love her . . . ! I don't know what to
do. You, my father, do try and quiet her and induce
her to go away from here."

The priest got up and went to the old woman.

" A mother's heart ! — ah ! who can estimate its love ?
yet God is merciful," said he.

The old woman's face suddenly became overcast
and she began to sob.

" God is merciful," repeated the priest when she
had grown a little calmer. " I may also tell you that
in my parish there was a sick woman much worse
than Maria Dmitrievna, and what do you think? —
a simple shopkeeper cured her by means of herbs
in a short time. And this same shopkeeper is now
in Moscow. I was telling Vasily Dmitrievich that
we might try the experiment At any rate, it might
afford the patient relief. With God all things are
possible."

" No, she won't live ! " interrupted the old woman.
" What will become of me if God takes her? " And
she gave way to such passionate emotion that she
lost consciousness.

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The husband of the invalid covered his face with
his hands and rushed out of the room.

The first person he met in the corridor outside was
his little lad, six years of age, chasing his little sister,
and full of the spirit of the thing.

" What! Didn't they tell you to bring the children
to mamma? " he asked the nurse.

" No, she didn't want to see them"

The little lad stopped for one instant, gazed intently
at his father's face, suddenly kicked out his foot, and
with a merry cry ran on further.

" She's pretending to be my little black horse,"
shrieked the lad, pointing at his little sister.

Meanwhile, in the other room, the sister was sitting
by the side of the invalid, and, by means of an art-
fully prepared conversation, was endeavouring to
prepare her for the thought of death. The doctor
was mixing a draught at the other window.

The invalid, in a white dressing-gown, and propped
up all round with pillows, was sitting up in bed and
looking at her sister in silence.

"Ah, my friend," she cried, suddenly interrupting
her, " don't prepare me ! Don't take me for a child
I'm a Christian woman, I know all about it I know
I have not long to live. I know that if my husband
had listened to me sooner I should now have been
in Italy, and possibly — nay, certainly — would have
been quite well They all told him so. But what
are we to do if God wills it so? We have all a great
many sins to answer for, I know that ; but I trust in
God's mercy to forgive us all—I am sure He will forgive
us all. I try to understand myself, and I know I have

268

Three Deaths

many sins to answer for, my friend. But then, what
a lot I have suffered ! I try to endure my sufferings
patiently."

" Then let me send for the little father, my friend,
it will be still easier for you to communicate, ,, said
the sister.

The invalid inclined her head by way of assent.

" God forgive me — a sinner ! " — she murmured.

The sister went out and beckoned to the little
father.

" She is an angel," she said to the husband with
tears in her eyes.

The husband began to weep, the priest passed
through the door, the old woman still remained un-
conscious, and everything in the antechamber was
perfectly quiet. In about five minutes the priest came
out of the door again, and, taking off the epitrachilion,
smoothed his hair.

"Thank God she is calmer now," said he, "she
wants to see you all."

The sister and the husband went in. The
invalid was weeping softly and looking at the holy
image.

" I congratulate you, my friend," said the husband.

" I thank you. How well it is with me now, what
an inexpressible joy I feel," said the invalid, and a
light smile played upon her thin lips. " How merciful
God is! — is He not? He is merciful and almighty."
And with an eager prayer on her lips and streaming
eyes, she again gazed upon the holy image.

Suddenly something seemed to occur to her, she
beckoned to her husband to draw near.

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More Tales from Tolstoi

"You never will do what I ask you," said she
with a weak and querulous voice.

The husband, extending his neck, listened humbly.

"What is it, my friend? "

" How many times haven't I said that these doctors
know nothing*? It is the simple medicines that really
cure. . . The little father has just been saying —
there's a shopkeeper . . . Send ! "

" For whom, my friend ? "

" My God, you will understand nothing," and the
sick woman frowned and closed her eyes.

The doctor came up and took her hand. The
pulse was plainly beating feebler and feebler. He
beckoned to the husband. The invalid observed the
gesture and looked round her in terror. The sister
turned aside and wept

" Don't weep, don't torture yourself and me ! "
said the invalid — " it deprives me of the little calm-
ness I have left"

"You are an angel," said the sister, kissing her
hand.

" No, no, kiss me here ! ... it is only corpses
whose hands we kiss ! My God, my God ! "

That same evening the invalid was already a corpse,
and the corpse was placed upon a bier in the saloon
of that large house. In that large apartment, with
closed doors, sat a solitary D'yac/iok* singing in
cadence through his nose the Psalms of David. The
bright light from the wax-candles on the large silver
candelabra fell on the white forehead of the defunct,
on her heavy waxen hands, on the stone-stiff folds

* A church singer.
270

Three Deaths

of the pall, and on the frightfully prominent knees
and toes. The Hyackok, without understanding
what he was saying, went on reciting in a deliberately
measured tone, and in that silent chamber the words
sounded and died away strangely. Now and then,
from a distant room, came flying the sound of childish
voices and childish uproar.

" When Thou hidest Thy Face they are troubled,"
saith the Psalter; "when Thou takest away their
breath they die and return again to their dust When
Thou sendest forth Thy Spirit they arise and renew
the face of the Earth. And the Glory of the Lord
shall endure for ever."

The face of the defunct was solemn and majestic
The pure cold forehead, the firmly-closed lips, were
motionless. She was all attention. But did she
understand even then those sublime words ?

IV.

In a month's time a marble monument was erected
over the tomb of the deceased. The grave of the
post-driver was still without its head-stone, and only
the bright green grass had covered the little mound
which served as the sole sign of the existence of a
man who had passed away.

" Great will be your sin, Serega, if you do not buy
a stone for Khveder," said the cook more than once.
"You've been saying winter's time enough, winter's
time enough, and even now you haven't kept your
word. It was all said and done at my place
remember."

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"Well, and have I said I wouldn't?" answered
Serega. " I'll buy a stone as I said I would ; I'll buy
a stone I say if I pay a rouble and a half for it I
have not forgotten that it must be put up. Whenever
I've occasion to go to town I'll buy it"

" You might, at any rate, put up a cross ! " put in
an old driver, " it's downright bad of you — why, you're
still wearing the boots! "

" Where shall I get a cross from? — you can't hew it
without a log."

" Can't hew it without a log, eh ? A nice excuse !
Take an axe, go into the wood early, and then
you'll hew it out easily enough! Cut down a
young aspen, and that'll give you a golubetP right
enough."

Early in the morning, when day had scarce begun
to dawn, Serega took his axe and went out into the
wood

Over everything lay a cold, whitish covering of still-
falling dew, unilluminated by the sun. The east was
brightening imperceptibly, and its feeble light was
reflected on the fine passing clouds suspended in the
vault of heaven. Not a single blade of grass below,
not a single leaf on the high branches of the trees
was astir. Only the rarely audible flutter of little
wings in the thickest part of the forest, or a rustling
on the ground disturbed the silence of the wood.
Suddenly, a sound strange to Nature arose, and then
died away again on the border of the forest But
again this sound arose, and began to be repeated
at regular intervals on the ground below, around

* A grave cross, with a covering over it.
272

Three Deaths

the trunk of one of the motionless trees. Next the
crown of one of the trees began to shiver unusually,
its sappy leaves began to whisper something, and a
wagtail sitting on one of its branches, took a hop
or two, and then, waving its tail, hopped, with a faint
piping cry, on to the next tree.

The axe below gave forth a deeper and deeper
sound, sappy white chips began to fly about on the
dewy grass, and a light cracking sound followed hard
upon the blows. The whole body of the tree
trembled, bent forward, and quickly righted itself
again, tottering fearfully to its very roots. For an
instant all was quiet, but again the tree stooped
forward a little ; the cracking in its trunk was again
audible, and, smashing its branches and shedding
abroad its twigs, it crashed down forwards on to the
damp earth. The sounds of the axe and the footsteps
ceased. The wagtail whistled again, and hopped
a little higher. The branch to which it had been
clinging rocked to and fro for a time, and then died
like the rest with all its leaves. The other trees
stood forth more beauteously and joyfully than ever,
with their motionless branches in this new free
space.

The first rays of the sun penetrating the transparent
clouds lit up the heavens, and rapidly traversed earth
and sky. The misty billows began to overflow the
valleys, the glistening dew played upon the green
foliage and herbage, transparent whitening clouds
ran in haste across the blue vault of heaven. The
birds swarmed restlessly in the depths of the forest,
and, as if beside themselves, kept twittering

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delightfully ; the sappy leaves whispered joyously and
calmly on the tree-tops, and the branches of the
living trees gravely, sublimely, rustled over the dead
body of the fallen tree.

274

X.— THE STORY OF IVAN THE FOOL

I.

Once upon a time, in a certain Kingdom in a
certain Empire, dwelt a rich muzhik. And this rich
muzhik had three sons — Simeon the Warrior, and
Taras Big Paunch, and Ivan the Fool, and a daughter,
Malan'ya Pitcher Ear, who was dumb. Simeon the
Soldier went to war to serve the Tsar, Taras Big
Paunch went to town to a merchant's to trade, and
Ivan the Fool and the girl remained at home to work
and earn stripes. Simeon the Warrior won for
himself a high office and an estate, and married a
gentleman's daughter. He had a large salary and a
large estate, and yet he could not make both ends
meet: what the husband gathered in the gentle-
woman-wife scattered with both hands ; there was
never any money. And Simeon went to his estate
to collect his rents. And his overseer said to him :
"There is nothing to take; we have neither cattle,
nor implements, nor horses, nor cows, nor ploughs,
nor harrows ; we must provide ourselves with every-
thing, and then there'll be something to collect."
And Simeon the Warrior went to his father and said :
" Thou art rich, little father, yet hast thou given me

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nought Give me a third portion, and I will go and
settle down on my estate."

But the old man answered: "Thou hast added
nought to the household ; wherefore, then, should
I give thee a third portion ? It would be to the hurt
and harm of Ivan and the girl."

But Simeon answered : " Why, he is but a fool,
and she is a dumb, pitcher-eared thing ; what good
would it be to them ? "

" But what does Ivan" say about it ? " asked the
old man.

Ivan said : " What does it matter ? Let him have
it!"

So Simeon the Warrior took the third portion and
departed to his estate, and then went away again to
serve the Tsar.

And Taras Big Paunch also earned a lot of money
and married a merchant's daughter, yet all he had
was too little for him. He also came to his father
and said : " Give me my portion ! "

The old man did not wish to give Taras his
portion.

"Thou hast added nought to us," said he, "and
Ivan hath earned all that is in the house. Nor can I
injure him and the girL"

But Taras said : rt What matters it to him ? he's
a fool ! To marry him is impossible, nobody would
take him ; and the girl, too, is dumb, and of no use to
anybody. Give me, Ivan," said he, " half of the corn.
I won't take the farm implements, and of the cattle I
will take only the dark-grey stallion — he is no good
to you for ploughing, you know."

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The Story of Ivan the Fool

Ivan began to laugh. " Well," said he, " I shall go
and turn about a little more, that's all."

So they gave to Taras his portion also. Taras
took the corn to town ; he took also the dark-grey
stallion, and left Ivan with nothing but an old mare
to go on doing farm labourer's work as before, and
support his father and mother.

II.

Now the Devil, that old serpent, was vexed that
the brothers had not quarrelled over their affairs, and
had parted amicably. And he called to him three of
his imps.

" You see," said he, " how these three brothers live,
Simeon the Warrior, and Taras Big Paunch, and
Ivan the Fool. We ought to have set them all by
the ears, and yet they live peaceably and treat one
another hospitably. This fool has spoiled all my
plans. Go now, ye three, and take these three
brothers in hand, and vex them till they tear each
other's eyes out Can you do this ? "

" We can," said the imps.

* How, then, will you set about it ? "

"Thus will we do," said they. "First of all we'll
ruin them all so utterly that they'll have nought to
eat, and then we'll huddle them together into one
heap, and they'll tear each other to pieces."

" Good ! " said the Devil " I see that you under-
stand your business. And now be off, and don't
come back to me till you have drawn the skins of all
three of them over their ears."

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More Taies from Tolstoi

Then the three imps retired into a swamp and
deliberated together as to how they should set about
the business. They wrangled and wrangled; each
one of them wanted to devise the easiest way to
carry out the affair, and at last they decided to cast
lots to determine what each of them was to do.
And it was agreed that if any one of them should
finish his part of the work before the others, he was
to come and help the other two. So the imps cast
lots, and fixed a time when they were again to come
together in the swamp to find out which of them
had finished his part of the work, and which of them
wanted help to finish his.

The set time arrived, and the imps came together
again in the swamp as agreed, to talk matters over.
And they told one another how things had gone
with them.

And the first imp began to tell them of Simeon
the Warrior. " My affair is finished," said he. " To-
morrow my Simeon returns to his father," said
he.

And his comrades fell to question him.

" How did you manage it ? " they asked.

" First of all," said he, " I inspired Simeon with
such valour that he promised his Tsar to win the
whole world for him. And the Tsar made Simeon
his chief captain and sent him to wage war against
the Tsar of India. So they went forth to war. And
the same night I moistened all the gunpowder in the
army of Simeon, and then I went to the Indian Tsar
and made him soldiers out of straw, as many as the
eye could see, and more. The soldiers of JUneon

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The Story of Ivan the Fool

saw the straw soldiers advancing upon them from
all sides, and they were afraid. Simeon ordered
them to fire the guns, and the guns would not go
off. The soldiers of Simeon were terrified, and ran
away like sheep. And the Indian Tsar routed them.
Simeon was wounded, and they took away from him
his estate and would have punished him on the
morrow. But I came at the nick of time and
released him from prison in order that he might run
away home. To-morrow my part of the job will be
finished ; but say, now, which of you two requires
help?"

Then the second imp began to tell them how
he had fared with Taras.

" I have no need of your help," said he, " my little
affair is also going along swimmingly. Taras wont
hold out for another week, I know. First of all,"
said he, " I made his big paunch stick out more than
ever, and inspired him with envy. So envious did
he become of other folks' goods that whatever he saw
he wanted to buy. He bought all that his eye could
see, and more ; he spent all his money, and he bought
yet more besides. Now he has begun to buy on
credit He has saddled himself finely, I can tell you,
and is so involved that he will never be able to
disengage himself. In a week it will be settling day,
and I will turn all his wares into rubbish ; he will
not be able to pay, and will return to his father's
house."

Then they began asking the third imp about Ivan.
' How did your affair go off? " they asked.

u Well, my affair hasn't come off at all," said he.
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* First of all I spat into his kvas* pitcher so as to
make his body ache, and I went over his fields and
beat the ground till it was as hard as a stone, so that
he could do nothing with it I thought he would not
plough it up, but he, fool as he is, came along with
his plough and began to toil away. He groaned
because his body ached, but he went on ploughing
all the same. I broke one ploughshare for him, but
home he went, put another to rights, harnessed two
fresh horses to it, and again set to work ploughing.
I crept up from under the ground to hold the plough-
shares, but I couldn't hold them fast anyhow ; then
I laid me on the plough, but the ploughshares were
very sharp and cut my hands to pieces. He
ploughed up nearly the whole field — only one little
strip remained, and so just because we have not
got the better of this one fellow all our labour is
thrown away. If the fool is let alone and continues
to do labourer's work the other two will want for
nothing, for he will support his two brothers."

Then Simeon the Warrior's imp promised to come
and help his fellow imp on the morrow, whereupon
the three imps separated.

III.

Ivan had ploughed up all his field, only one tiny
strip remained unploughed. He came the next day
to finish his ploughing. His body ached, but the
ploughing had to be done. He saw to the harness-
gear, turned the plough round, and began to plough.

* An acid beverage of the Russian peasants.
28o

The Story of Ivan the Fool

He had made the turn of the field once, and was
coming back when, just as if it had stuck to some
root, the plough began to drag heavily. It was the
little imp, who had wound his legs firmly round the
ploughshare, and was holding on fast "What
marvel is this ? " thought Ivan, " there are no roots
here, yet it is a root" Ivan thrust his hand into the
furrow and felt it — it was soft. He seized upon
something and drew it forth. It was like a black
root, and on the root something was moving. Lo
and behold ! it was a live imp. " Ugh ; 'tis thou,
then, thou filthy one ! " said Ivan. Ivan swung his
hand round and would have smashed the imp, but
the imp besought him.

" Don't beat me," said he, " and I'll do whatever you
desire/ 1

" What can you do for me ? "

" Only say what you want ! "

Ivan scratched his head. "My stomach aches,"
said he at last, " can you put it right ? "

" Yes," said the im.p.

"Then cure it!"

The imp bent over the furrow and scraped and
scraped with his nails, and drew out S little root, or
rather three little roots intertwined, and gave them
to Ivan.

" Look ! " said he, " whoever swallows one of these
tiny roots loses all his pains."

So Ivan took it, broke off one little root, and
swallowed it. And immediately his stomach was
quite well.

Again the imp besought him. " Let me go now ! "
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More Tales from Tolstoi

said he. " I will vanish through the earth, I don't
want to roam about any more."

" Very well," said Ivan, " God be with you ! " And
no sooner had he pronounced the name of God than
the imp vanished rapidly under the earth like a stone
dropped into water, leaving nothing but a hole in the
ground behind him. And Ivan thrust the other two
little roots into his hat and went on ploughing till
he had finished. He ploughed away to the very end
of the little unploughed strip, turned his plough
about, and went home. He entered the house, and
there was his elder brother, Simeon the Warrior,
sitting down with his wife and having supper. They
had taken away his property, he had escaped from
his dungeon by the skin of his teeth, and he had run
home to live with his father.

Simeon caught sight of Ivan. "I have come to
live with you," said he ; " feed me and my wife till
we have found a fresh place for ourselves."

" All right," said he, " you may live here if you like."

All that Ivan wanted was to sit down at the end
of the bench, but the smell of Ivan was by no means
agreeable to the gentlewoman-wife of Simeon the
Soldier. " I cannot have my supper with a stinking
muzhik," said she to her husband.

Then said Simeon the Soldier: w My lady," said
he, "does not like your smell, you had better eat
your supper in the outhouse."

" All right," said Ivan. " It is also time for me to
go to bed and feed the mare."

So Ivan took his bread and his caftan and went to
his night lodging.

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The Story of Ivan the Fool
IV.

That night the imp of Simeon the Soldier, having
finished the work he had in hand, went, according to
agreement, to seek the imp of Ivan to assist him to
do for the fool. He went into the ploughed field
and searched and searched for his comrade, but
nowhere was he to be found — all he could see was
a hole in the ground. "Well," thought he, "some
mischief must have happened to my comrade ; I must
take his place. The field has been ploughed to the
very end. We must torment the fool out of his wits
in the hay field."

So the imp went into the meadow and fell upon
Ivan's hay crop, and he covered the whole of the
hay with mud. At dawn of day Ivan left his bed,
took out his scythe and went into the meadow to
mow. Ivan reached the meadow and began to mow ;
he swung his arm round once or twice, the scythe
was blunted and would not cut — he had to sharpen
it. Ivan exerted his whole strength again and again.
"No, it is no good," said he, "I will go home and
bring out a bench and a big round hearthcake. If
I have to toil and moil for a week I won't leave off
till I have mowed this field from one end to the
other."

The imp heard this, and thought to himself: " This
fool is a regular out-and-outer, there's no getting
over him. We must have resort to something else."

So Ivan came, took out his scythe, and began to
mow. The imp crept through the grass and seized
the scythe by the blade in order to shove the sharp

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More Tales from Tolstoi

end into the ground It was hard work for Ivan,
but he mowed away to the very end — at last only a
little bit of rough ground on the swamp remained.
The imp crept into the swamp, and he thought to
himself: "Even if I lose my paws by it, 111 not
allow him to mow the place to the very end." Ivan
waded into the swamp ; from the look of it the grass
did not seem very thick, yet the scythe could not
turn it over. Ivan grew wroth, he began to swing
his arms with all his might ; the imp began to give
in, he could not leap back quickly enough ; he saw
that it was a bad business, and he hid himself in the
bushes. Ivan swung his arms still more vigorously,
came trampling through the bushes and sliced off
half of the imp's tail. Ivan mowed his field to the
very end, ordered the wench to rake it together, while
he himself went to mow his rye.

He went out with a reaping-hook, and the imp
with the docked tail, who was already on the spot,
tangled all the rye so that the hook could make
no way with it Ivan turned him about, took a
sickle, and began to mow the rye down, and mowed
every bit of the rye. " I must now go and gather
the rye," said he.

The imp with the docked tail heard this and
thought : " I couldn't manage the rye, but I'll go
and play havoc with the oats ; only wait till to-
morrow ! " The imp came running in the early morn-
ing to the oat field, and the oats were already mown.
Ivan had mown it down in the night so as to waste
no time. The imp was very wroth. u This fool," said
he, "has maimed and tormented me. In warfare,

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The Story of Ivan the Fool

even, I have not seen such wounds. The accursed
one never sleeps, and there is no overtaking him.
I'll now go to the ricks and spoil the whole lot of
them for him."

And the imp went to the rye ricks and crept
among the sheaves and began to spoil them : he
warmed them well and warmed himself, and then
fell asleep.

But Ivan harnessed the mare and came along with
the wench to carry away the corn. He came to the
rye ricks and began to pitch the sheaves, one by one,
on to the wagon. He pitched down two sheaves,
thrust in his hand for another, and caught the imp
from behind. He raised it up and looked at it.
There was a live imp struggling on the pitchfork
and his tail was docked, and the creature was writh-
ing and struggling and trying to get away.

"Hillo! thou filthy one, here again, eh?" cried
Ivan.

" That was my brother. I am another one. I was
with your brother Simeon the Soldier," said the imp.

" Well," said Ivan, " whether you were here before
or not, your fate shall be the same," and he would
have smashed the vile thing there and then. But
the imp besought him, saying :

" Let me go and Til do nothing more, and I'll also
do whatever you want"

" But what can you do ? "

" I can make soldiers out of whatever you like."

" But whafs the good of them ? "

"They can do whatever you turn them to, they
can do everthing."

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More Tales from Tolstoi

" Can they sing songs ? "

" Yes, they can."

M Then make them for me," said Ivan.

And the imp said : " Look now ! take one of these
rye sheaves, shake it on the ground, and say only
these words :

* By my henchman's leave
Cease to be a sheaf!'

and you'll have as many soldiers as you have straws
in your hand."

Ivan took the sheaf, shook it on the ground, and
said as the imp had bidden him. And the sheaf
leapt asunder and the straws turned into soldiers, and
in front of them marched the drummer drumming
and the trumpeter trumpeting. And Ivan laughed
heartily when he saw it

" Aye ! but you're clever," said he. " This is
capital — it will amuse the wench."

" And now," said the imp, " let me go ! "

"No," said Ivan, "I shall only do this thing for
sport, but not a grain of corn shall be thrown away
for nothing. Teach me how to turn them into
sheaves again. I shall want to thresh them out"

And the imp said : " Say :

1 So many soldiers,
So many straw stalks,
By my henchman's command
As sheaves again stand.' "

Ivan said this, and the soldiers became sheaves
again.

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The Story of Ivan the Fool

Then the imp besought him again and said : " Let
me go now ! "

" Very well/' said Ivan, and pressing him down, he
stretched out his arm and pulled him off the pitch-
fork " In God's name," said he ; and no sooner had
he spoken of God than the imp plunged under
ground like a stone thrown in the water, and only a
hole remained.

Ivan went home, and at home he found his second
brother, Taras, sitting down with his wife having
supper. Taras Big Paunch had not settled his
accounts, but had run away from his debts and gone
to his father. Now he caught sight of Ivan.

" Hillo, Ivan ! " said he, " while I look about me a
bit you must feed me and my wife."

" Very well," said Ivan, " you may live here if you
like."

Then Ivan took off his caftan and sat down to
table.

But the merchant's wife said : " I cannot eat with
the fool, he smells of sweat."

Then Taras Big Paunch also said: u You have
not a nice smell, Ivan, go and take you meals in the
shed."

"All right! "said he, and taking up his bread he
went into the yard. "It just suits me," said he, " I
can now feed the mare at the right time."

The imp of Taras Big Paunch left him that same
evening, and went to help his comrades, as arranged,

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More Tales from Tolstoi

to get the better of Ivan the Fool. He went into
the ploughed field and searched for his comrades, but
there was no trace of them — all that he saw was a
hole in the ground. He went to the meadow and
there, near the swamp, he found part of a tail, and
in the stubble field where the rye ricks were he found
another hole. " Well," thought he, " 'tis plain some
mischief has befallen my comrades. I must step
into their shoes and take this fool in hand myself."

So the imp went to look for Ivan. Now Ivan had
already risen, and was cutting wood in the forest.

The brothers, now that they lived together, found
themselves straitened for room, and had bidden the
fool go to the forest to cut wood and build them
new houses.

The imp ran into the forest, climbed on to a twig,
and began to hamper Ivan in his endeavours to fell a
tree. Ivan had cut down the tree in such a way as
to make it fall where it ought to fall, in a clear space,
but the tree fell badly, where it ought not to have
fallen, and stuck in some branches. Ivan cut out a
section of it and began to force it over sideways —
only with the utmost exertion did he succeed at last
in felling the tree. Then Ivan set about cutting
down another, and it was just the same thing over
again. He toiled and moiled, and only by the
utmost efforts did he fell the tree clear. He tackled
a third, and again it was the same thing all over
again. Ivan had thought of cutting out half a
hundred lathes, and he had not cut ten and already
night was at the door. And Ivan was sore vexed.
A steaming sweat streamed from off him like a mist

288

The Story of Ivan the Fool

rising from a forest, and yet he did not throw up
his task. He went on chopping wood, and his back
began to ache till he could scarce stand, so he laid
aside his axe and sat him down to rest.

The imp heard how Ivan had suddenly become
quite quiet, and rejoiced greatly. "Ah! ha!"
thought the imp, "he is tired out — he has chucked
it. I shall be able to rest a bit, too, now." And he
sat astraddle on his twig and rejoiced.

But Ivan, getting up again, seized his axe, stretched f--

out his arms, and hewed away on the other side, till
suddenly the tree began to crack and came thundering
down.

This time the imp was not quick enough ; he did
not draw out his leg in time, the twig broke, and the
imp was caught fast by the paw. Ivan began clear-
ing away the ground, and lo ! there was a live imp.
Ivan was astonished.

" Ugh, there you are again, vilest one ! " said Ivan.

* I am not that imp, but another. I was with your
brother Taras," said the imp.

"Well, whichever you are, your fate will be the
same ! " And Ivan waved his axe, and would have
smitten him dead with the back of it.

Then the imp besought him. " Kill me not," said
he, " and I will do whatever you wish me to do."

" And what can you do, then ? "

"I can make as much money for you as you
want."

" Come along, then, and make some ! "

And the imp taught him the trick.

11 Take," said he, u a leaf from that oak and rub it
289 T

More Tales from Tolstoi

between your hands, and gold will fall upon the
ground."

And Ivan took the leaves and rubbed them, and
showers of gold fell all around them.

" That will be very nice," said Ivan, " when we
play games with the children on festivals."

" And now let me go ! " said the imp.

"Very well," replied Ivan, and released the imp.
" God be with you ! " said he. And no sooner had
he named the name of God than the imp plunged
beneath the ground like a stone into the water,
leaving but a hole behind him.

VI.

The brothers built up their house and lived apart.
But Ivan, having done his work in the fields, brewed
beer and invited his brothers to come and make
merry with him. But the brothers would not be
Ivan's guests. "Clodhopper merriment," said they,
" we will take no notice of."

So Ivan feasted the muzhiks and the women, and
drank a good skinful himself, and went out tipsy into
the street to take part in the round dances. Ivan
approached the dancers and bade the women exalt
him and call him father.

" I'll give you," said he, " things the like of which
you have never seen before."

The women began to laugh, and called him all
sorts of high-sounding names. And when they had
made an end of praising him they said : " Come

290

The Story of Ivan the Fool

along, now! give us something as you said you
would."

" I'll bring you something immediately," said he,
and seizing a seed-box he rushed off into the forest.
The women began to laugh, and said : w Ha ! ha !
what a fool it is ! " and they forgot all about him.
But look ! Ivan comes running back from the forest
again, and he carries his seed-box full of something.

" Have some, eh ? "

" Yes, yes, give us some ! "

Then Ivan thrust his hand into the seed-box, drew
out a fist full of gold, and threw it to the women.
" Oh, little father ! " cried they, and the women flung
themselves on the gold and began to pick it up.
Then the men also came running out, and fought
each other for it. One old woman was nearly
crushed to death. Ivan fell a-laughing.

" Ah ! you fools ! " said he, " why do you trample
on the old woman ? Come out of that and 111 give
you even more." And he flung more and more
among them. The people came running together,
and Ivan emptied the whole seed-box among them.
They asked him for still more.

But Ivan said : " That's all. Another time 111 give
you some more. Now dance a bit and sing songs."

Then the women began to sing songs.

" Your singing is not good," said he.

" Can you do it better ? " said they.

u 111 show you that straight away," he answered.
And he went into the barn and drew out a sheaf,
brought it down, placed it on the ground, and gave it
a smart tap. " Well," cried he :

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More Tales from Tolstoi

" With my henchman's leave,
Cease to be a sheaf,
And for each little stalk
Let a soldier walk ! "

And the sheaf leaped asunder, and every separate
straw became a soldier, with drums and trumpets all
playing merrily. Then Ivan bade the soldiers play
songs, and marched with them down the street The
good folks were amazed. So when the soldiers had
played their songs a little while, Ivan led them back
into the barn, forbidding anyone to follow after him,
and turned the soldiers into a sheaf again, and flung
it on to the rick. Then he went home and lay down
to sleep in the cow-house.

VII.

In the morning the elder brother, Simeon the
Soldier, heard of all these goings on, so he came
to Ivan.

"Reveal to me," said he, "where you got the
soldiers from, and where you have stowed them."

" What is that to you ? " said Ivan.

"What is that to me? Why, with soldiers you
can do everything. You can even gain yourself a
kingdom."

Ivan was astounded. " Why didn't you tell me so
long ago ? " said he. " I will make for you as many
as you please. Why, the wench and I will have
a fine time of it" And Ivan led his brother into the
barn and said : " Look now ! I'll make 'em for you,
and you can march 'em away, for when it comes

292

The Story of Ivan the Fool

to feeding them they would swallow up the whole
village. Simeon the Warrior promised to lead away
the soldiers, and Ivan set about making them. He
tapped on the threshing-floor with the sheaf, and
there stood a regiment ; he tapped with another
sheaf and there stood another ; he made such a lot of
soldiers that the whole field was full of them.

" Is that enough for you, eh ? "

Simeon was delighted and said . " That'll do.
Thanks, Ivan."

" All right ! If you want any more, come here and
Til make 'em for you. There are lots of straw stalks
going now."

So Simeon the Warrior marshalled his soldiers on
the spot, put them into proper order, and went off to
the wars.

No sooner had Simeon the Warrior departed than
Taras Big Paunch arrived. He, too, had heard of
the goings-on yester evening, and began to beseech
his brother. "Reveal to me," said he, "where you
got all those gold coins. If I had so much money
at my disposal I could add more and more money
to it and bring it in from every corner of the
earth."

Ivan was astonished. " Why didn't you tell me so
before ? " said he. " I will rub out for you as many
as you please."

His brother was delighted. " Give me three seed-
boxes full," said he.

"Come along, then, into the forest," said Ivan,
" and put to the horse that you may carry it all away ;
you can't carry it."

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More Tales from Tolstoi

So they went into the forest, and Ivan began
plucking leaves from the trees and rubbing them
between his hands. Soon he had* strewn abroad a
large heap.

"Will that do you, eh?"

Taras was delighted. "That will do for the
present Thanks, Ivan."

" Pooh ! " said he, •' if ever you want any more come
to me, I will rub out a lot more — there are heaps of
leaves left. ,,

So Taras Big Paunch carried off a whole cart-load
of money, and went off to trade with it.

Both the elder brothers had departed therefore.
Simeon the Warrior had gone to the wars and Taras
had gone to trade. And Simeon the Warrior won a
kingdom by his warfare, and Taras Big Paunch made
a whole pile of money by trading.

And the two brothers met together and told each
other all about themselves. Simeon told Taras
whence he had got his soldiers, and Taras told
Simeon whence he had got his money.

Moreover, Simeon the Warrior said to his brother :
" I have now won a kingdom by my warfare, and it
is well with me, only I want money to feed my
soldiers."

And Taras Big Paunch said : " I, too, have made a
mountain of money, only the worst of it is I have
none to guard it, and that bothers me."

" Come, then ! " said Simeon to Taras, " let us go
to our brother. I will bid him make some more
soldiers, and Til give them to you to guard your
money, and you must bid him rub out some more

294

The Story of Ivan the Fool

money that I may have the wherewithal to feed my
soldiers"

So they went to seek Ivan.

They came to Ivan, and Simeon said to him :
" Little brother, my soldiers are too few for me ;
make me some more soldiers — two more sheaves will
do it if you change them."

Ivan shook his head. " It's no good," said he, " I'll
make you no more soldiers."

" But how is this ? You promised you would ! "

" I promised," said he, " but Til make no more."

" But why won't you make any more, you fool ? "

" Because your soldiers kill people. A day or two
ago I was walking along the road and what do I see ?
a woman digging a grave by the road, and she was
weeping. I asked her : * Who is dead ? ' And she
said : ' Simeon's soldiers have slain my husband.' I
thought that soldiers were only for singing songs, and
they murder people. I'll make no more of them."

And he was obstinate, and would make no more
soldiers.

And Taras Big Paunch also began asking Ivan the
Fool to make him some more gold pieces.

Ivan shook his head. " It's no good," said he, " I'll
rub no more."

" But how is this ? You promised you would."

" I promised," said he, " and I will rub no more."

" But why wont you, you fool ? "

" Because your gold pieces took away Mikhailov's
cow."

"Took away! How?"

" Twas thus. Mikhailov had a cow, and it gave
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More Tales from Tolstoi

milk to the children, and a day or two ago the
children came to me and begged for milk. 'But
where is your cow ? ' I said to them. They said :
' Taras Big Paunch's overseer came along and gave
mammy three gold pieces for the cow, and she gave
him the cow, and now we've no milk to sup.' I
thought gold pieces were only counters to play with,
and you take away the children's cow with them. I'll
give no more."

And the fool was obstinate, and would give no
more. So the brothers went away.

The brothers went away and consulted together
how they might best cure the mischief. And Simeon
said : " Look now ! I'll tell you what we will do.
You give me money to feed my soldiers, and I'll give
you half a kingdom, with soldiers to guard your
money." And Taras consented. So the brothers
divided their goods, and both of them became kings,
and both were very rich.

VIII.

But Ivan stayed at home and nourished his father
and mother, and laboured in the fields with his dumb
sister.

Now, one day Ivan's old house-dog fell sick and
grew mangy* and was on the point of expiring. Ivan
was sorry for it He got some bread from the dumb
girl, put it into his hat, and carried it out to the dog
and threw it to him. Now, the hat was torn, and
along with the bread a little root fell out of it, and
the old dog snapped it up with the bread. And no

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sooner had it swallowed the little root than the dog
began to skip and play about, and barked and
wagged its tail, and was quite well.

Ivan's father and mother saw it, and were
astonished.

But Ivan said : " I had two little roots which cure
every disease, and the dog must have swallowed one."

And it happened about this time that the King's
daughter fell ill, and the King proclaimed throughout
all the towns and villages that whoever cured his
daughter the King would reward him, and if the man
were a bachelor he would give him this selfsame
daughter to wife. And this proclamation was made
in Ivan's village also.

Then his father and mother called Ivan and said
to him : " Have you heard what the King has pro-
claimed ? You said you had a healing root ; go now
and cure the King's daughter. You will be happy
ever after."

" All right ! " cried Ivan, and he prepared to go.
They dressed him up, and Ivan came out on the top
of the staircase, and there stood a poor beggar with a
crooked arm.

" I have heard," said he, " that you can cure diseases.
Cure my arms, for I cannot even put on my boots."

" All right ! " said Ivan, and he got out the root,
gave it to the poor beggar, and told him to swallow
it. And the poor beggar swallowed the root and
was quite cured, and immediately began to wave his
arms about Then Ivan's father and mother came
out to lead him to the King, and when they heard
that Ivan had given ^way his last little root and had

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nothing left to cure the King's daughter] with they
began to curse him.

u He had pity on this beggar-man," said they, u and
had no pity on the King's daughter."

Then Ivan felt sorry for the King's daughter also,
so he harnessed his horse, flung some straw stalks in
a chest, and prepared to drive off.

" Where are you going, you fool ? "

" To cure the King's daughter."

u But you have nought to cure her with,"

" All right ! " cried he, and whipped up the horses.

He came to the King's Court, and no sooner had
he begun to mount the staircase than the King's
daughter was cured.

The King rejoiced greatly, and commanded that
Ivan should be brought before him, and they dressed
him in gallant array.

u Will you be my son-in-law ? " said the King.

* All right ! " said Ivan, so they married Ivan to the
Princess. Soon after that the King died, and Ivan
became king. So all three brothers were now kings.

IX.

So the three brothers lived and ruled as kings.

With the elder brother, Simeon the Warrior, things
went well. He got real soldiers by means of his
straw soldiers. He commanded that every ten houses
throughout his kingdom should furnish him with a
soldier, and each of these soldiers was to have a big

TOM? ^ a WhitC b ° dy and a Clean face ' And h *
S ogether a great many of such soldiers and taught

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The Story of Ivan the Fool

them their business thoroughly. And if anyone
thwarted him in aught, immediately he sent forth
these soldiers and did whatsoever seemed good to
him.

And everyone began to fear Simeon the Warrior.

And his life was a good and pleasant thing.
Whatever he imagined, and whatever he fixed his
eyes upon, that thing became his. The soldiers went
out and took away and bought in and appropriated
everything that he wanted.

And life was a good and pleasant thing to Taras
Big Paunch likewise. He did not lose the money he
had got from Ivan, but more money grew out of it.
And he, too, kept good order in his kingdom. His
own money he stowed away in chests, and squeezed
more money out of the people. He squeezed money
from their going to and fro, and from their bast shoes,
and from their sandals, and from the lappets of
their garments, and from their very souls. And
whatsoever his heart desired that he had. They
brought everything to him for the sake of a few
little coins, and they came to work for him because
everyone wanted money.

Nor did Ivan the Fool have a bad time of it. No
sooner had he buried his father-in-law than he took
off all his royal robes and gave them to his wife to
hide away in a big chest, put on again his working
shirt and trousers and his sandals, and set to work
again. "I feel dull," he said, "and my belly will
grow big, and I shall neither eat nor sleep." So
he fetched his father and mother and dumb sister,
and set to work again.

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" But you're the King ! " said they.

" Well ! " said he, " and I mean to have the appetite
of a king."

His Minister came to him and said : " We have no
money to pay salaries with."

" All right I M said he, " if you have no money don't
pay them."

" But in that case people wont serve."

"All right!" said Ivan, "let them not serve, they
will be at more liberty to work. Let them cart the
manure, there's lots of it to cart"

And they came to Ivan that he might judge
between them. And one said : " He has robbed me
of my money."

"All right !" said Ivan ; " no doubt he wanted it."

They all recognised that Ivan was a fooL Even
his wife said to him : " They say that you are a fool."

"All right!" said he.

Ivan's wife fell a-thinking and a-thinking about it,
and she also became a fool.

" Why should I go against my husband ? " said she.
u Where there's a needle there there's a thread." So
she took off her royal raiment and packed it away in
a chest, and went to the dumb wench to learn from
her how to work. And she learnt how to work, and
began to help her husband.

And all the sensible folks left Ivan's kingdom —
only the fools remained in it. And not one of them
had any money. They lived and worked and
supported themselves, and they also supported good
people.

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X.

Now the old Devil waited and waited for news
from the three imps as to how they had set the three
brothers by the ears. He waited and waited, and
no news came. He himself went out for news, and
searched and searched, but nothing could he discover
but three holes. "Well," thought he, "it is clear
they have not prevailed. I must see to this business
myself."

He pursued his investigations, and there was no
trace of the brothers in their old quarters. He found
them at last in different kingdoms, and all three
of them were reigning monarchs. And the thing
offended the old Devil.

"Well," said he, "I'll take this matter in hand
myself."

And first of all he went to King Simeon. Not in
his own shape did he go, but he turned himself into a
general, and so he came to King Simeon. " I have
heard," said he, " that you, King Simeon, are a great
warrior, and I myself am well versed in this business,
and I would serve you."

King Simeon thereupon put sundry questions to
him, saw that he was a wise man, and took him into
his service.

And the new general of King Simeon began to
show him how to collect together a large army.

"The first thing," said he, "is to enlist more
soldiers, and in your kingdom there are a great many
people who only play the fool. You must take," said
he, " all the young men without exception, and then

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your army will be five times larger than it was before.
The next thing you must do is to introduce new
weapons and firearms. I will supply you with fire-
arms which will fire off one hundred bullets a time as
if they were so many peas. And I will supply you
with cannons which will belch forth fire continuously.
Everything will be burnt up, whether it be men, or
horses, or walls."

King Simeon obeyed his new general, and ordered
all the young men, one after another, to be made into
soldiers, and introduced new gun factories, and they
turned out new firearms and cannons, and imme-
diately declared war upon the neighbouring king.
No sooner were the armies face to face than King
Simeon commanded his soldiers to fire flames and
bullets out of his guns and firearms, and immediately
one half of the hostile army was crippled and con-
sumed. The neighbouring king was frightened and
submitted, and surrendered his kingdom.

Simeon the Warrior was delighted. " And now,"
said he, " I will war against the Kinj of India."

But the King of India had heard about Simeon
the Warrior, and borrowed from him all his inven-
tions, and added thereto still more of his own. The
King of India took for soldiers not only all the young
men but all the unmarried women also, so he got
together an army even larger than the army of
Simeon the Warrior ; and he borrowed, too, the ideas
of all his guns and firearms from Simeon the Warrior,
and devised besides aerial machines, which should
hurl down mangling bombs from above.

King Simeon and his army therefore went against
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The Story of Ivan the Fool

the King of India, and Simeon thought that he could
conquer as before, and mow down everything before
him. But the King of India did not allow Simeon
the Warrior to have the first shot, but sent his women
soldiers up into the air to cast down mangling bombs
on to the army of Simeon. And the women stood
above the army of Simeon like a storm above a lot
of cockroaches, and they cast down bombs and dis-
persed the whole army of Simeon the Warrior till
only Simeon himself was left. The Indian King
then seized the army of Simeon, and Simeon the
Warrior fled from before the eyes of men.

So the old Devil got the better of the eider brother,
and next he went to King Taras. He turned him-
self into a merchant, and settled down in the kingdom
of Taras and began to start business and circulate
money. The merchant gave a high price for every-
thing, and all the people flocked to him to make
money. And the people made so much money that
they paid all their arrears of taxation, and all the
taxes due from them were paid instantly.

King Taras rejoiced. " Thanks to this merchant/'
thought he, " I shall now have more money than ever,
and life will be an even better thing than it was
before."

And King Taras began to have new ideas, and
began to build himself a new palace. And he pro-
claimed to the people that they should bring him
timber and stone and work for him, and offered high
prices for everything. And King Taras fancied that
the people would come flocking after his money as
before, and work for him. But behold ! they were

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carrying all the wood and all the stone to the
merchant, and all the working people were flocking
to him. King Taras offered still more, but the
merchant out-bidded him. King Taras had a lot of
money, but the merchant had still more, and the
merchant prevailed over the King. The royal palace
was at a standstill ; it could not be built King Taras
laid out a garden. Autumn came, and King Taras
invited the people to come and plant his garden for
him. Not one of them came ; they were all engaged
in digging a pond for the merchant Winter came.
King Taras thought of buying sable skins to make
him a new fur pelisse. He sent forth to buy some,
but his messenger came back and told him that there
were no sables to be had — all the pelts were in the
possession of the merchant; he offered more for
them than the King, and was making carpets of the
sables. King Taras wanted to buy stallions. He
sent out his servants to buy some, but his messengers
came back and said : All the good stallions are at the
merchant's, and they are carrying water for him to
fill his pond. All the King's affairs were at a stand-
still ; people did nought for him and did everything
for the merchant, and they only brought him the
merchant's money to pay their taxes with.

And the King had such a heap of money that
he knew not where to stow it, and his life was
wretched. The King ceased to plan great plans ; if
only he could keep body and soul together that was
enough for him now, and even this he could scarce
do. He was straitened in every directioa Even his
cook and his coachman wouldn't stop with him, but

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The Story of Ivan the Fool

went over to the merchant At last he had not
enough victuals to feed himself with. He sent out
into the bazaar to buy some ; there were none to be
had, the merchant had bought them all up, and all
the King now had was the money with which they
paid the taxes.

King Taras grew wroth, and banished the merchant
from his kingdom. But the merchant settled down
just outside his borders, and did the same as before :
everything to be sold departed from the King and
went after the merchant and his money. The King
was indeed in evil case. All day long he had nothing
to eat, and the rumour spread that the merchant
boasted he would buy up the King himself. King
Taras was afraid, and knew not what would become
of him.

And now Simeon the Warrior came to him and
said: "Help me, the King of India has conquered
my kingdom."

But King Taras himself was in a tight place.

M I have had nothing to eat for two days," said he.

XL

Thus the old Devil subdued the two elder brothers,
and now he went on to Ivan. The old Devil turned
himself into a general, and tried to persuade him to
raise an army, "It becomes not a king to live
without an army," said he ; " give but the command
and I'll raise up soldiers for you out of your people
and make an army for you."

Ivan listened to him. " All right ! " said he ; " let's
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More Tales from Tolstoi

have an army, then, and teach them to play nice
music ; that's what I love."

And the old Devil made the circuit of Ivan's
kingdom to select volunteers. And he told them
all to clean shave, and promised them a stoop of
vodka and a nice coloured cap.

The fools burst out laughing. "We have lots of
wine already/' said they ; " we make it ourselves, and
as for caps, our old women sew them together for us
as many as we like, nice variegated ones, and with
pretty fringes into the bargaia"

So not one of them would come. The old Devil
thereupon went to Ivan. "Your fools won't come
willingly," said he, "we must drive them to it by
force."

" All right ! " said Ivan ; " drive them by force,
then!"

And the old Devil announced that all the people
were to come to be enrolled as soldiers, and whoever
did not come him would Ivan put to death.

Then the fools came to the general and said :
" You tell us that if we do not come to be soldiers the
King will put us. to death, but you do not tell us
what will become of us when we are soldiers. They
say that soldiers become soldiers to be killed, is this
so?"

" Yes, it cannot but be so."

When the fools heard this they were still more
obstinate.

" We wont come," said they. " Better far to allow
ourselves to be killed at home. Death we cannot
avoid anyhow."

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The Story of Ivan the Fool

"Fools that you are!" said the old Devil; "you
may or may not be killed if you become soldiers,
but if you will not come, King Ivan will certainly
put you to death."

The fools thought it well over, and then they came
to Ivan the Fool and asked him saying : " The
general has proclaimed that you have commanded us
all to become soldiers. ' If you go to be soldiers/ he
said, ' you may or you may not be killed, but if you
do not go, King Ivan will certainly put you to death.'
Is that true?"

Ivan laughed.

" How can I, one man, put all you to death ? If
I were not a fool I would explain it all to you, but
I wouldn't go myself."

" Then we will not go," said they.

So the fools went to the general and refused to
become soldiers.

The old Devil saw that it was no go, so he went to
the King of Tarakan and wormed himself into his
confidence.

" Let us go," said he, " and conquer the kingdom
of King Ivan ; the only thing he hasn't got is money,
but he has plenty of corn and cattle and other good
things."

So the King of Tarakan went to war. He collected
a large army, many firearms, no end of guns, crossed
the border, and entered the kingdom of Ivan.

They came to Ivan and said : " The King of
Tarakan is waging war upon us."

" All right," said he, " let him come ! "

The King of Tarakan crossed the border with his
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army, and sent forth his advance guard to seek
everywhere for the army of Ivan. They sought and
sought, but there was no trace of any army. They
waited and waited, but there was no appearance of an
army anywhere. And the rumour spread — there is
no army and none to fight with. The King of
Tarakan sent forth soldiers to seize the villages.
The soldiers came to one village, and all the fools,
male and female, came rushing out to look at the
soldiers and wonder at them. The soldiers began to
take away the corn and cattle of the fools, and the
fools gave them away, and none said the soldiers nay.
The soldiers came to another village, and it was the
same thing over again. They gave up everything,
none resisted, but called to the soldiers to come and
live with them. " If ye have a bad time of it, dear
friends," said they, " come and live with us altogether."
The soldiers went on and on— there was no army to
be seen, and the whole people lived on what they
produced, and fed themselves and all good folks, and
did not resist, and called to the soldiers to come and
live with them.

The soldiers found things dull, and they came
back to the King of Tarakan and said : " There is no
warfare to wage here, take us to some other place.
Real war we understand, but this is like flogging a
dead horse. We cannot wage war here any more."

The King of Tarakan was angry, and he bade the
soldiers go through the whole kingdom and destroy
the villages and houses, and burn the corn and kill
all the cattle. " If you do not obey my command,"
said he, " I will punish you."

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The Story of Ivan the Fool

Then the soldiers were afraid, and they began to
do their King's command. They began to burn the
corn and the houses and to kill the cattle. And all
along the fools did not resist, but only wept. The
old men wept, and the old women wept, and the
little children wept.

"Why do you harm us like this?" they cried.
"Why do you repay good with evil? If you want it
you had better take it away for yourselves."

Then the soldiers felt they had had enough of it.
They went no further, and the whole army dispersed.

XII.

Then the old Devil departed — he had not prevailed
over Ivan with his soldiers.

Then the old Devil turned himself into an honest
gentleman, and came to live in the kingdom of Ivan ;
he would try to prevail over him by means of his
money as he had prevailed with Taras Big Paunch.

" I want to do good to you," said he ; "I want to
teach you a thing or two. I want to build a house in
your kingdom and start a business," said he.

" All right ! " they said, " live as you please."

The honest gentleman passed the night there, and
next morning he went out into the market-place
carrying a large basket full of gold and leaves of
paper, and he said : " You are all living like swine, I
want to teach you how you ought to live. You build
me a house according to this plan. You work, and
I'll show you how to do it, and Til pay you golden
coins for it." And he showed them the gold.

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The fools were astonished : they had no stores of
money laid by, and they exchanged with each other
whatever things they wanted, and paid for it by
labour. So they were astonished at the gold

" What nice counters," they said. And they began
to give the gentleman things in kind and labour in
exchange for the gold pieces.

The old Devil began to circulate his gold as he
had done in the kingdom of Taras, a nd all sorts of
things were brought to him, and all sorts of service
rendered in exchange for the gold. The old Devil
rejoiced, and he thought to himself: "My job is well
in hand ! I shall now ruin the fool as I did Taras,
and buy him up body and soul. ,,

As soon as the fools had got the gold pieces they
divided them among the women for necklaces ; all
the girls plaited the coins in their hair, and all the
children played with them in the street. All of them
had such a lot that they didn't want any more. And
the gentleman's big building was not half built yet,
and he had not provided himself with corn and cattle
for a single year yet And the gentleman advertised
for people to come and work for him and bring him
corn and cattle, and he would give them gold pieces
for everything they brought and every bit of work
they did.

But nobody came to work, and nobody brought
anything. Only now and then did a little boy or
a little girl come running to exchange an egg for a
gold piece ; and at last nobody would bring him
anything to eat at all. The honest gentleman grew
hungry, and went into a village to buy himself some

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The Story of Ivan the Fool

dinner. He poked his nose into one farm and offered
a gold piece for a hen, but the woman of the farm
would not take it. " I have got such a lot of them/'
she said. He next went to a poor landless man
to buy a herring, and offered a gold piece for it.
" I don't want it, my good man," said he ; " I have
no children who might like to play with it, and I
have already three pieces which I am keeping as
curiosities." Next he went to a muzhik for some
bread. And the muzhik wouldn't take the money.
"I don't want it," said he. "But wait a little, for
Christ's sake, and I'll tell my old woman to cut you
a slice." Then the Devil fell a-spitting, and ran
away from the muzhik. He wouldn't take anything
for Christ's sake, not he — the very sound of the word
was worse than a knife to him.

So he did not get any bread. They had all stored
it up. Wherever the old Devil might go nobody
gave him anything for money, and they all said :
"Bring something else, or come and work, or take
this for Christ's sake." And the Devil had nothing
at all but money. Work he could not, and it was
impossible for him to take anything for Christ's sake.
The old Devil grew very wroth. " What else do you
want when I give you money ? " said he. " You can
buy everything for gold, and can hire every sort of work-
ing man." The fools, however, did not listen to him.

" No," said they, " we don't want it. They require
no payments or taxes from us — what do we want
with money ? "

So the old Devil lay down to sleep without any
supper.

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The news of the affair came to the ears of Ivan the
Fool. The people came to him and inquired, saying :
"What are we to do? An honest gentleman has
appeared among us, and he likes to eat and drink
comfortably, and he likes to dress nicely, but he wont
work, and he won't ask for anything in Christ's name,
and he does nothing but give golden pieces to every-
one. Formerly we gave him everything we could
put our hands upon, and now we give no more.
What are we to do with him? He may die of
hunger."

Ivan listened to them attentively. "Well, I
suppose we must feed him," said he. " Let him go
about from house to house as the shepherds do."

So the old Devil had nothing for it but to go
about from house to house.

At last it became the turn of Ivan's house to
receive him. The old Devil came to dine, and Ivan's
dumb wench was getting the dinner ready. The
lazier ones used often to deceive her. Those who
did not work used to come earliest to dinner and
eat up all the pottage. And the dumb wench artfully
tried to discover the loafers by their hands : who-
ever had hard and horny hands to him she gave a
full fresh meal, and whoever had not hard hands to
him she gave scraps. The old Devil crept behind
the table, and the dumb wench seized him by the
hand to see whether his hand was hard and horny,
and his hands were clean and smooth and his nails
were long. Then the <lumb wench began to make a
racket, and dragged the Devil away from the table.

And Ivan's wife said to him: "Don't howl, my
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The Story of Ivan the Fool

pretty gentleman ; at our house my sister-in-law
only lets those with horny hands sit down to table.
Wait a bit till the others have eaten their fill, and
then you can come and eat what they have left"

And the old Devil was offended because the King
wanted him to feed with swine. And he said to
Ivan : " Little fool that you are, you have a law in
your kingdom that all people must work with their
hands. This you have devised from sheer stupidity.
Is it only with their hands that people work ? Have
you ever reflected with what intelligent people
work?"

And Ivan said: "How should we fools get to
know it ? We always work with our hands and with
our bent backs."

"That's because you are fools. But I," said he,
"will teach you how to work with your head, and
then you will know that it is far more profitable to
work with your head than with your hands."

Ivan was astonished. " Indeed 1" said he, "not in
vain, then, are we called fools."

And the old Devil said: "Only it is not easy,"
said he, " to work with your head. You do not give me
to eat simply because my hands are not horny, and
yet you don't know that it is a hundred times more
laborious to work with your head. Why, it makes
your head ache like anything if you stick to it"

Ivan was astonished. "Why then torment your-
self so, my dear friend ? " said he. " Is it so light a
matter to make your head ache so? Far better,
surely, to do the little sort of work, with your hands
and your bent back ? "

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And the Devil said: "I bother my head about
it because I am so sorry for you, you fools. If I did
not bother myself you would be fools all your life
long. But I work a bit with my head, and I'll now
teach you to do the same."

Ivan was astonished. "Teach away, then," said
he, " and my hands will die a second time, as you are
going to swop them for my head."

And the Devil promised to teach him.

And Ivan proclaimed through his kingdom that
the nice, honest gentleman would come and teach
everyone how to work with his head, and how to
work out very much more with the head than with
the hands, and they were all to come and be taught

And a high watch-tower was erected in Ivan's
kingdom, and a straight staircase leading up to it,
and on the top of it was a belvedere. And Ivan
took the gentleman up there that he might be seen by
all.

So the gentleman went up into the watch-tower
and began to speak from there. And the fools
gathered together to look on. The fools thought
that the gentleman was actually going to show them
how to work with the head without the hands. But
the old Devil only taught them with words how it
was possible to go on living withput working.

The fools understood not a word. They stared
and stared, and then went about their business.

The old Devil stood all day on the watch-tower ;
he stood there all through the second day, and he
talked the whole time. He would have very much
liked something to eat, but the fools had no idea of

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The Story of Ivan the Fool

this, so they brought no bread to him on the top
of the watch-tower. They thought that if he could
work so much better with his head than with his
hands, it would be a mere trifle for him to earn
himself some bread with his head. So the old
Devil continued standing on the watch-tower all
through the second day, talking all the time. And
the people went to look at him, and when they had
looked their fill they came away.

" Well ! " asked Ivan, " has the gentleman begun to
work with his head ? "

" Not yet," they said ; " he hasn't left off chattering
yet."

The old Devil remained on the watch-tower for
yet another day, and he began to get weak; he
staggered once or twice, and knocked his head
against a post One of the fools saw this and told it
to Ivan's wife, and Ivan's wife ran out to her husband
into the field where he was ploughing.

" Come ! " said she, " and look ; they say that the
gentleman has now begun to work with his head."

Ivan was astonished.

"Well, come," said he, and he turned the horse's
head and went to the watch-tower. They came to
the watch-tower, and by that time the old Devil was
quite weak in the head, and began to totter and
knock his head against the post again and again.
Ivan had no sooner come to the place than the Devil
stumbled, fell, and came thundering down the stair-
case, knocking his head against every single step on
his way down, as if he wanted to count them all.

"Well!" said Ivan, " the honest gentleman spoke the
315

More Tales from Tolstoi

truth when he said that next time he would make his
aead ache. Why, horny hands are nothing to this ;
work of this sort would pretty soon give one lumps
on the head" And Ivan would have gone to see
if much work had been done, when suddenly the
ground opened and the old Devil plunged through
the earth — only a hole remained.

Ivan scratched his head. " Ugh ! the filthy
creature ! So it is he again, eh ! Like children, like
father— I'm well rid of him ! "

And Ivan is living to this day, and all the people
crowded into his kingdom, and his brothers came to
him, and he fed them. Any who like may come and
say : " Feed us ! " " All right ! " says Ivan, " live with
us ; we have plenty of everything." There is only one
settled custom in his kingdom : those who have horny
hands sit at table, and those who have not must eat
the scraps.

THE END.

316

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